THE FAIR-HAIRED STRANGER.
"Why, you must be in love with her yourself!"
"I in love with her? Sheila and I are too old friends for that!"
The speakers were two young men seated in the stern of the steamer
Clansman as she ploughed her way across the blue and rushing waters of
the Minch. One of them was a tall young fellow of three-and-twenty, with
fair hair and light blue eyes, whose delicate and mobile features were
handsome enough in their way, and gave evidence of a nature at once
sensitive, nervous and impulsive. He was clad in light gray from head to
heel--a color that suited his fair complexion and yellow hair; and he
lounged about the white deck in the glare of the sunlight, steadying
himself from time to time as an unusually big wave carried the Clansman
aloft for a second or two, and then sent her staggering and groaning
into a hissing trough of foam. Now and again he would pause in front of
his companion, and talk in a rapid, playful, and even eloquent fashion
for a minute or two; and then, apparently a trifle annoyed by the slow
and patient attention which greeted his oratorical efforts, would start
off once more on his unsteady journey up and down the white planks.
The other was a man of thirty-eight, of middle height, sallow complexion
and generally insignificant appearance. His hair was becoming
prematurely gray. He rarely spoke. He was dressed in a suit of rough
blue cloth, and indeed looked somewhat like a pilot who had gone ashore,
taken to study and never recovered himself. A stranger would have
noticed the tall and fair young man who walked up and down the gleaming
deck, evidently enjoying the brisk breeze that blew about his yellow
hair, and the sunlight that touched his pale and fine face or sparkled
on his teeth when he laughed, but would have paid little attention to
the smaller, brown-faced, gray-haired man, who lay back on the bench
with his two hands clasped round his knee, and with his eyes fixed on
the southern heavens, while he murmured to himself the lines of some
ridiculous old Devonshire ballad or replied in monosyllables to the
rapid and eager talk of his friend.
Both men were good sailors, and they had need to be, for although the
sky above them was as blue and clear as the heart of a sapphire, and
although the sunlight shone on the decks and the rigging, a strong
north-easter had been blowing all the morning, and there was a
considerable sea on. The far blue plain was whitened with the tumbling
crests of the waves, that shone and sparkled in the sun, and ever and
anon a volume of water would strike the Clansman's bow, rise high in
the air with the shock, and fall in heavy showers over the forward
decks. Sometimes, too, a wave caught her broadside, and sent a handful
of spray over the two or three passengers who were safe in the stern;
but the decks here remained silvery and white, for the sun and wind
speedily dried up the traces of the sea-showers.
At length the taller of the young men came and sat down by his
companion: "How far to Stornoway yet?"
"An hour."
"By Jove, what a distance! All day yesterday getting up from Oban to
Skye, all last night churning our way up to Loch Gair, all to-day
crossing to this outlandish island, that seems as far away as
Iceland;--and for what?"
"But don't you remember the moonlight last night as we sailed by the
Cuchullins? And the sunrise this morning as we lay in Loch Gair? Were
not these worth coming for?"
"But that was not what you came for, my dear friend. No. You came to
carry off this wonderful Miss Sheila of yours, and of course you wanted
somebody to look on; and here I am, ready to carry the ladder and the
dark lantern and the marriage-license. I will saddle your steeds for you
and row you over lakes, and generally do anything to help you in so
romantic an enterprise."
"It is very kind of you, Lavender," said the other with a smile, "but
such adventures are not for old fogies like me. They are the exclusive
right of young fellows like you, who are tall and well-favored, have
plenty of money and good spirits, and have a way with you that all the
world admires. Of course the bride will tread a measure with you. Of
course all the bridesmaids would like to see you marry her. Of course
she will taste the cup you offer her. Then a word in her ear, and away
you go as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and as if the
bridegroom was a despicable creature merely because God had only given
him five feet six inches. But you couldn't have a Lochinvar five feet
six."
The younger man blushed like a girl and laughed a little, and was
evidently greatly pleased. Nay, in the height of his generosity he began
to protest. He would not have his friend imagine that women cared only
for stature and good looks. There were other qualities. He himself had
observed the most singular conquests made by men who were not
good-looking, but who had a certain fascination about them. His own
experience of women was considerable, and he was quite certain that the
best women, now--the sort of women whom a man would respect--the women
who had brains--
And so forth and so forth. The other listened quite gravely to these
well-meant, kindly, blundering explanations, and only one who watched
his face narrowly could have detected in the brown eyes a sort of amused
consciousness of the intentions of the amiable and ingenuous youth.
"Do you really mean to tell me, Ingram," continued Lavender in his rapid
and impetuous way--"do you mean to tell me that you are not in love with
this Highland princess? For ages back you have talked of nothing but
Sheila. How many an hour have I spent in clubs, up the river, down at
the coast, everywhere, listening to your stories of Sheila, and your
praises of Sheila, and your descriptions of Sheila! It was always
Sheila, and again Sheila, and still again Sheila. But, do you know,
either you exaggerated or I failed to understand your descriptions; for
the Sheila I came to construct out of your talk is a most incongruous
and incomprehensible creature. First, Sheila knows about stone and lime
and building; and then I suppose her to be a practical young woman, who
is a sort of overseer to her father. But Sheila, again, is romantic and
mysterious, and believes in visions and dreams; and then I take her to
be an affected school-miss. But then Sheila can throw a fly and play her
sixteen-pounder, and Sheila can adventure upon the lochs in an open
boat, managing the sail herself; and then I find her to be a tom-boy.
But, again, Sheila is shy and rarely speaks, but looks unutterable
things with her soft and magnificent eyes; and what does that mean but
that she is an ordinary young lady, who has not been in society, and who
is a little interesting, if a little stupid, while she is unmarried, and
who after marriage calmly and complacently sinks into the dull domestic
hind, whose only thought is of butchers' bills and perambulators?"
This was a fairly long speech, but it was no longer than many which
Frank Lavender was accustomed to utter when in the vein for talking. His
friend and companion did not pay much heed. His hands were still clasped
round his knee, his head leaning back, and all the answer he made was to
repeat, apparently to himself, these not very pertinent lines:
"In Ockington, in Devonsheer,
My vather he lived vor many a yeer;
And I his son with him did dwell,
To tend his sheep: 'twas doleful well.
Diddle-diddle!"
"You know, Ingram, it must be precious hard for a man who has to knock
about in society, and take his wife with him, to have to explain to
everybody that she is in reality a most unusual and gifted young person,
and that she must not be expected to talk. It is all very well for him
in his own house--that is to say, if he can preserve all the sentiment
that made her shyness fine and wonderful before their marriage--but a
man owes a little to society, even in choosing a wife."
Another pause.
"It happened on a zartin day
Four-score o' the sheep they rinned astray:
Says vather to I, 'Jack, rin arter 'm, du!'
Sez I to vather, 'I'm darned if I du!'
Diddle-diddle!"
"Now you are the sort of a man, I should think, who would never get
careless about your wife. You would always believe about her what you
believed at first; and I dare say you would live very happily in your
own house if she was a decent sort of woman. But you would have to go
out into society sometimes; and the very fact that you had not got
careless--as many men would, leaving their wives to produce any sort of
impression they might--would make you vexed that the world could not
off-hand value your wife as you fancy she ought to be valued. Don't you
see?"
This was the answer:
"Purvoket much at my rude tongue,
A dish o' brath at me he vlung,
Which so incensed me to wrath,
That I up an' knack un instantly to arth.
Diddle-diddle!"
"As for your Princess Sheila, I firmly believe you have some romantic
notion of marrying her and taking her up to London with you. If you
seriously intend such a thing, I shall not argue with you. I shall
praise her by the hour together, for I may have to depend on Mrs. Edward
Ingram for my admission to your house. But if you only have the fancy as
a fancy, consider what the result would be. You say she has never been
to a school; that she has never had the companionship of a girl of her
own age; that she has never read a newspaper; that she has never been
out of this island; and that almost her sole society has been that of
her mother, who educated her and tended her, and left her as ignorant of
the real world as if she had lived all her life in a lighthouse.
Goodness gracious! what a figure such a girl would cut in South
Kensington!"
"My dear fellow," said Ingram at last, "don't be absurd. You will soon
see what are the relations between Sheila Mackenzie and me, and you will
be satisfied. I marry her? Do you think I would take the child to London
to show her its extravagance and shallow society, and break her heart
with thinking of the sea, and of the rude islanders she knew, and of
their hard and bitter struggle for life? No. I should not like to see my
wild Highland doe shut up in one of your southern parks among your tame
fallow-deer. She would look at them askance. She would separate herself
from them; and by and by she would make one wild effort to escape, and
kill herself. That is not the fate in store for our good little Sheila;
so you need not make yourself unhappy about her or me.
'Now all ye young men, of every persuasion,
Never quarl wi' your vather upon any occasion;
For instead of being better, you'll vind you'll be wuss,
For he'll kick you out o' doors, without a varden in your puss!
Diddle-diddle!'
Talking of Devonshire, how is that young American lady you met at
Torquay in the spring?"
"There, now, is the sort of woman a man would be safe in marrying!"
"And how?"
"Oh, well, you know," said Frank Lavender. "I mean the sort of woman who
would do you credit--hold her own in society, and that sort of thing.
You must meet her some day. I tell you, Ingram, you will be delighted
and charmed with her manners and her grace, and the clever things she
says; at least, everybody else is."
"Ah, well!"
"You don't seem to care much for brilliant women," remarked the other,
rather disappointed that his companion showed so little interest.
"Oh yes, I like brilliant women very well. A clever woman is always a
pleasanter companion than a clever man. But you were talking of the
choice of a wife; and pertness in a girl, although it may be amusing at
the time, may become something else by and by. Indeed, I shouldn't
advise a young man to marry an epigrammatist, for you see her shrewdness
and smartness are generally the result of experiences in which _he_ has
had no share."
"There may be something in that," said Lavender carelessly; "but of
course, you know, with a widow it is different; and Mrs. Lorraine never
does go in for the _ingenue_."
The pale blue cloud that had for some time been lying faintly along the
horizon now came nearer and more near, until they could pick out
something like the configuration of the island, its bays and
promontories and mountains. The day seemed to become warmer as they got
out of the driving wind of the Channel, and the heavy roll of the sea
had so far subsided. Through comparatively calm water the great Clansman
drove her way, until, on getting near the land and under shelter of the
peninsula of Eye, the voyagers found themselves on a beautiful blue
plain, with the spacious harbor of Stornoway opening out before them.
There, on the one side, lay a white and cleanly town, with its shops
and quays and shipping. Above the bay in front stood a great gray
castle, surrounded by pleasure-grounds and terraces and gardens; while
on the southern side the harbor was overlooked by a semicircle of hills,
planted with every variety of tree. The white houses, the blue bay and
the large gray building set amid green terraces and overlooked by wooded
hills, formed a bright and lively little picture on this fresh and
brilliant forenoon; and young Lavender, who had a quick eye for
compositions which he was always about to undertake, but which never
appeared on canvas, declared enthusiastically that he would spend a day
or two in Stornoway on his return from Borva, and take home with him
some sketch of the place.
"And is Miss Sheila on the quay yonder?" he asked.
"Not likely," said Ingram. "It is a long drive across the island, and I
suppose she would remain at home to look after our dinner in the
evening."
"What? The wonderful Princess Sheila look after our dinner! Has she
visions among the pots and pans, and does she look unutterable things
when she is peeling potatoes?"
Ingram laughed: "There will be a pretty alteration in your tune in a
couple of days. You are sure to fall in love with her, and sigh
desperately for a week or two. You always do when you meet a woman
anywhere. But it won't hurt you much, and she won't know anything about
it."
"I should rather like to fall in love with her, to see how furiously
jealous you would become. However, here we are."
"And there is Mackenzie--the man with the big gray beard and the peaked
cap--and he is talking to the chamberlain of the island."
"What does he get up on his wagonette for, instead of coming on board to
meet you?"
"Oh, that is one of his little tricks," said Ingram with a good-humored
smile. "He means to receive us in state, and impress you, a stranger,
with his dignity. The good old fellow has a hundred harmless ways like
that, and you must humor him. He has been accustomed to be treated _en
roi_, you know."
"Then the papa of the mysterious princess is not perfect?"
"Perhaps I ought to tell you now that Mackenzie's oddest notion is that
he has a wonderful skill in managing men, and in concealing the manner
of his doing it. I tell you this that you mayn't laugh and hurt him when
he is attempting something that he considers particularly crafty, and
that a child could see through."
"But what is the aim of it all?"
"Oh, nothing."
"He does not do a little bet occasionally?"
"Oh dear! no. He is the best and honestest fellow in the world, but it
pleases him to fancy that he is profoundly astute, and that other people
don't see the artfulness with which he reaches some little result that
is not of the least consequence to anybody."
"It seems to me," remarked Mr. Lavender with a coolness and a shrewdness
that rather surprised his companion, "that it would not be difficult to
get the King of Borva to assume the honors of a papa-in-law."
The steamer was moored at last: the crowd of fishermen and loungers drew
near to meet their friends who had come up from Glasgow--for there are
few strangers, as a rule, arriving at Stornoway to whet the curiosity of
the islanders--and the tall gillie who had been standing by Mackenzie's
horses came on board to get the luggage of the young men.
"Well, Duncan," said the elder of them, "and how are you, and how is Mr.
Mackenzie, and how is Miss Sheila? You have not brought her with you, I
see."
"But Miss Sheila is ferry well, whatever, Mr. Ingram, and it is a great
day, this day, for her, tat you will be coming to the Lewis; and it wass
tis morning she wass up at ta break o' day, and up ta hills to get some
bits o' green things for ta rooms you will hef, Mr. Ingram. Ay, it iss
a great day, tis day, for Miss Sheila."
"By Jove, they all rave about Sheila up in this quarter!" said Lavender,
giving Duncan a fishing-rod and a bag he had brought from the cabin. "I
suppose in a week's time I shall begin to rave about her too. Look
sharp, Ingram, and let us have audience of His Majesty."
The King of Borva fixed his eye on young Lavender, and scanned him
narrowly as he was being introduced. His welcome of Ingram had been most
gracious and friendly, but he received his companion with something of a
severe politeness. He requested him to take a seat beside him, so that
he might see the country as they went across to Borva; and Lavender
having done so, Ingram and Duncan got into the body of the wagonette,
and the party drove off.
Passing through the clean and bright little town, Mackenzie suddenly
pulled up his horses in front of a small shop, in the window of which
some cheap bits of jewelry were visible. The man came out, and Mr.
Mackenzie explained with some care and precision that he wanted a silver
brooch of a particular sort. While the jeweler had returned to seek the
article in question, Frank Lavender was gazing around him in some wonder
at the appearance of so much civilization on this remote and
rarely-visited island. There were no haggard savages, unkempt and
scantily clad, coming forth from their dens in the rocks to stare wildly
at the strangers. On the contrary, there was a prevailing air of comfort
and "bienness" about the people and their houses. He saw handsome girls
with coal-black hair and fresh complexions, who wore short and thick
blue petticoats, with a scarlet tartan shawl wrapped round their bosom
and fastened at the waist; stalwart, thick-set men, in loose blue jacket
and trowsers and scarlet cap, many of them with bushy red beards; and
women of extraordinary breadth of shoulder, who carried enormous loads
in a creel strapped on their back, while they employed their hands in
contentedly knitting stockings as they passed along. But what was the
purpose of these mighty loads of fish-bones they carried--burdens that
would have appalled a railway porter of the South?
"You will see, sir," observed the King of Borva in reply to Lavender's
question, "there is not much of the phosphates in the grass of this
island; and the cows they are mad to get the fish-bones to lick, and it
iss many of them you cannot milk unless you put the bones before them."
"But why do the lazy fellows lounging about there let the women carry
those enormous loads?"
Mr. Mackenzie stared: "Lazy fellows! They hef harder work than any you
will know of in your country; and besides the fishing they will do the
ploughing and much of the farm-work. And iss the women to do none at
all? That iss the nonsense that my daughter talks; but she has got it
out of books, and what do they know how the poor people hef to live?"
At this moment the jeweler returned with some half dozen brooches
displayed on a plate, and shining with all the brilliancy of cairngorm
stones, polished silver and variously-colored pebbles.
"Now, John Mackintyre, this is a gentleman from London," said Mackenzie,
regarding the jeweler sternly, "and he will know all apout such fine
things, and you will not put a big price on them."
It was now Lavender's turn to stare, but he good-naturedly accepted the
duties of referee, and eventually a brooch was selected and paid for,
the price being six shillings. Then they drove on again.
"Sheila will know nothing of this--it will be a great surprise for her,"
said Mackenzie, almost to himself, as he opened the white box and saw
the glaring piece of jewelry lying on the white cotton.
"Good heavens, sir!" cried Frank Lavender, "you don't mean to say you
bought that brooch for your daughter?"
"And why not?" said the King of Borva in great surprise.
The young man perceived his mistake, grew considerably confused, and
only said, "Well, I should have thought that--that some small piece of
gold jewelry, now, would be better suited for a young lady."
Mackenzie smiled shrewdly: "I had something to go on. It wass Sheila
herself was in Stornoway three weeks ago, and she wass wanting to buy a
brooch for a young girl who has come down to us from Suainabost and is
very useful in the kitchen, and it wass a brooch just like this one she
gave to her."
"Yes, to a kitchen-maid," said the young man meekly.
"But Mairi is Sheila's cousin," said Mackenzie with continued surprise.
"Lavender does not understand Highland ways yet, Mr. Mackenzie," said
Ingram from behind. "You know we in the South have different fashions.
Our servants are nearly always strangers to us--not relations and
companions."
"Oh, I hef peen in London myself," said Mackenzie in somewhat of an
injured tone; and then he added with a touch of self-satisfaction, "and
I hef been in Paris, too."
"And Miss Sheila, has she been in London?" asked Lavender, feigning
ignorance.
"She has never been out of the Lewis."
"But don't you think the education of a young lady should include some
little experience of traveling?"
"Sheila, she will be educated quite enough; and is she going to London
or Paris without me?"
"You might take her."
"I have too much to do on the island now, and Sheila has much to do. I
do not think she will ever see any of those places, and she will not be
much the worse."
Two young men off for their holidays, a brilliant day shining all around
them, the sweet air of the sea and the moorland blowing about
them,--this little party that now drove away from Stornoway ought to
have been in the best of spirits. And indeed the young fellow who sat
beside Mackenzie was bent on pleasing his host by praising everything he
saw. He praised the gallant little horses that whirled them past the
plantations and out into the open country. He praised the rich black
peat that was visible in long lines and heaps, where the townspeople
were slowly eating into the moorland. Then all these traces of
occupation were left behind, and the travelers were alone in the
untenanted heart of the island, where the only sounds audible were the
humming of insects in the sunlight and the falling of the streams. Away
in the south the mountains were of a silvery and transparent blue.
Nearer at hand the rich reds and browns of the moorland softened into a
tender and beautiful green on nearing the margins of the lakes; and
these stretches of water were now as fair and bright as the sky above
them, and were scarcely ruffled by the moorfowl moving out from the
green rushes. Still nearer at hand great masses of white rock lay
embedded in the soft soil; and what could have harmonized better with
the rough and silver-gray surface than the patches of rose-red
bell-heather that grew up in their clefts or hung over their summits?
The various and beautiful colors around seemed to tingle with light and
warmth as the clear sun shone on them and the keen mountain-air blew
over them; and the King of Borva was so far thawed by the enthusiasm of
his companions that he regarded the far country with a pleased smile, as
if the enchanted land belonged to him, and as if the wonderful colors
and the exhilarating air and the sweet perfumes were of his own
creation.
Mr. Mackenzie did not know much about tints and hues, but he believed
what he heard; and it was perhaps, after all, not very surprising that a
gentleman from London, who had skill of pictures and other delicate
matters, should find strange marvels in a common stretch of moor, with a
few lakes here and there, and some lines of mountain only good for
sheilings. It was not for him to check the raptures of his guest. He
began to be friendly with the young man, and could not help regarding
him as a more cheerful companion than his neighbor Ingram, who would sit
by your side for an hour at a time without breaking the monotony of the
horses' tramp with a single remark. He had formed a poor opinion of
Lavender's physique from the first glimpse he had of his white fingers
and girl-like complexion; but surely a man who had such a vast amount of
good spirits and such a rapidity of utterance must have something
corresponding to these qualities in substantial bone and muscle. There
was something pleasing and ingenuous too about this flow of talk. Men
who had arrived at years of wisdom, and knew how to study and use their
fellows, were not to be led into these betrayals of their secret
opinions; but for a young man--what could be more pleasing than to see
him lay open his soul to the observant eye of a master of men? Mackenzie
began to take a great fancy to young Lavender.
"Why," said Lavender, with a fine color mantling in his cheeks as the
wind caught them on a higher portion of the road, "I had heard of Lewis
as a most bleak and desolate island, flat moorland and lake, without a
hill to be seen. And everywhere I see hills, and yonder are great
mountains which I hope to get nearer before we leave."
"We have mountains in this island," remarked Mackenzie slowly as he kept
his eye on his companion--"we have mountains in this island sixteen
thousand feet high."
Lavender looked sufficiently astonished, and the old man was pleased. He
paused for a moment or two, and said, "But this iss the way of it: you
will see that the middle of the mountains it has all been washed away by
the weather, and you will only have the sides now dipping one way and
the other at each side o' the island. But it iss a very clever man in
Stornoway will tell me that you can make out what wass the height o' the
mountain, by watching the dipping of the rocks on each side; and it iss
an older country, this island, than any you will know of; and there were
the mountains sixteen thousand feet high long before all this country
and all Scotland and England wass covered with ice."
The young man was very desirous to show his interest in this matter, but
did not know very well how. At last he ventured to ask whether there
were any fossils in the blocks of gneiss that were scattered over the
moorland.
"Fossils?" said Mackenzie. "Oh, I will not care much about such small
things. If you will ask Sheila, she will tell you all about it, and
about the small things she finds growing on the hills. That iss not of
much consequence to me; but I will tell you what is the best thing the
island grows: it is good girls and strong men--men that can go to the
fishing, and come back to plough the fields and cut the peat and build
the houses, and leave the women to look after the fields and the gardens
when they go back again to the fisheries. But it is the old people--they
are ferry cunning, and they will not put their money in the bank at
Stornoway, but will hide it away about the house, and then they will
come to Sheila and ask for money to put a pane of glass in their house.
And she has promised that to every one who will make a window in the
wall of their house; and she is very simple with them, and does not
understand the old people that tell lies. But when I hear of it, I say
nothing to Sheila--she will know nothing about it--but I hef a watch put
upon the people; and it wass only yesterday I will take back two
shillings she gave to an old woman of Borvabost that told many lies.
What does a young thing know of these old people? She will know nothing
at all, and it iss better for some one else to look after them, but not
to speak one word of it to her."
"It must require great astuteness to manage a primitive people like
that," said young Lavender with an air of conviction; and the old man
eagerly and proudly assented, and went on to tell of the manifold
diplomatic arts he used in reigning over his small kingdom, and how his
subjects lived in blissful ignorance that this controlling power was
being exercised.
They were startled by an exclamation from Ingram, who called to
Mackenzie to pull up the horses just as they were passing over a small
bridge.
"Look there, Lavender! did you ever see salmon jumping like that? Look
at the size of them!"
"Oh, it iss nothing," said Mackenzie, driving on again. "Where you will
see the salmon, it is in the narrows of Loch Roag, where they come into
the rivers, and the tide is low. Then you will see them jumping; and if
the water wass too low for a long time, they will die in hundreds and
hundreds."
"But what makes them jump before they get into the rivers?"
Old Mackenzie smiled a crafty smile, as if he had found out all the ways
and the secrets of the salmon: "They will jump to look about them--that
iss all."
"Do you think a salmon can see where he is going?"
"And maybe you will explain this to me, then," said the king with a
compassionate air: "how iss it the salmon will try to jump over some
stones in the river, and he will see he cannot go over them; but does he
fall straight down on the stones and kill himself? Neffer--no, neffer.
He will get back to the pool he left by turning in the air: that is what
I hef seen hundreds of times myself."
"Then they must be able to fly as well as see in the air."
"You may say about it what you will please, but that is what I
know--that is what I know ferry well myself."
"And I should think there were not many people in the country who knew
more about salmon than you," said Frank Lavender. "And I hear, too, that
your daughter is a great fisher."
But this was a blunder. The old man frowned: "Who will tell you such
nonsense? Sheila has gone out many times with Duncan, and he will put a
rod in her hands: yes, and she will have caught a fish or two, but it
iss not a story to tell. My daughter she will have plenty to do about
the house, without any of such nonsense. You will expect to find us all
savages, with such stories of nonsense."
"I am sure not," said Lavender warmly. "I have been very much struck
with the civilization of the island, so far as I have seen it; and I
can assure you I have always heard of Miss Sheila as a singularly
accomplished young lady."
"Yes," said Mackenzie somewhat mollified, "Sheila has been well brought
up: she is not a fisherman's lass, running about wild and catching the
salmon. I cannot listen to such nonsense, and it iss Duncan will tell
it."
"I can assure you, no. I have never spoken to Duncan. The fact is,
Ingram mentioned that your daughter had caught a salmon or two--as a
tribute to her skill, you know."
"Oh, I know it wass Duncan," said Mackenzie, with a deeper frown coming
over his face. "I will hef some means taken to stop Duncan from talking
such nonsense."
The young man, knowing nothing as yet of the child-like obedience paid
to the King of Borva by his islanders, thought to himself, "Well, you
are a very strong and self-willed old gentleman, but if I were you I
should not meddle much with that tall keeper with the eagle beak and the
gray eyes. I should not like to be a stag, and know that that fellow was
watching me somewhere with a rifle in his hands."
At length they came upon the brow of the hill overlooking
Garra-na-hina[H] and the panorama of the western lochs and mountains.
Down there on the side of the hill was the small inn, with its little
patch of garden; then a few moist meadows leading over to the estuary of
the Black River; and beyond that an illimitable prospect of heathy
undulations rising into the mighty peaks of Cracabhal, Mealasabhal and
Suainabhal. Then on the right, leading away out to the as yet invisible
Atlantic, lay the blue plain of Loch Roag, with a margin of yellow
seaweed along its shores, where the rocks revealed themselves at low
water, and with a multitude of large, variegated and verdant islands
which hid from sight the still greater Borva beyond.
They stopped to have a glass of whisky at Garra-na-hina, and Mackenzie
got down from the wagonette and went into the inn.
"And this is a Highland loch!" said Lavender, turning to his companion
from the South. "It is an enchanted sea: you could fancy yourself in the
Pacific, if only there were some palm trees on the shores of the
islands. No wonder you took for an Eve any sort of woman you met in such
a paradise!"
"You seem to be thinking a good deal about that young lady."
"Well, who would not wish to make the acquaintance of a pretty girl,
especially when you have plenty of time on your hands, and nothing to do
but pay her little attentions, you know, and so forth, as being the
daughter of your host?"
There was no particular answer to such an incoherent question, but
Ingram did not seem so well pleased as he had been with the prospect of
introducing his friend to the young Highland girl whose praises he had
been reciting for many a day.
However, they drank their whisky, drove on to Callernish, and here
paused for a minute or two to show the stranger a series of large
so-called Druidical stones which occupy a small station overlooking the
loch. Could anything have been more impressive than the sight of these
solitary gray pillars placed on this bit of table-land high over the
sea, and telling of a race that vanished ages ago, and left the
surrounding plains and hills and shores a wild and untenanted solitude?
But, somehow Lavender did not care to remain among those voiceless
monuments of a forgotten past. He said he would come and sketch them
some other day. He praised the picture all around, and then came back to
the stretch of ruffled blue water lying at the base of the hill. "Where
was Mr. Mackenzie's boat?" he asked.
They left the high plain, with its _Tuir-sachan_,[I] or Stones of
Mourning, and descended to the side of the loch. In a few moments,
Duncan, who had been disposing of the horses and the wagonette,
overtook them, got ready the boat, and presently they were cutting
asunder the bright blue plain of summer waves.
At last they were nearing the King of Borva's home, and Ingram began to
study the appearance of the neighboring shores, as if he would pick out
some feature of the island he remembered. The white foam hissed down the
side of the open boat. The sun burned hot on the brown sail. Far away
over the shining plain the salmon were leaping into the air, catching a
quick glint of silver on their scales before they splashed again into
the water. Half a dozen sea-pyes, with their beautiful black and white
plumage and scarlet beaks and feet, flew screaming out from the rocks
and swept in rapid circles above the boat. A long flight of solan geese
could just be seen slowly sailing along the western horizon. As the
small craft got out toward the sea the breeze freshened slightly, and
she lay over somewhat as the brine-laden winds caught her and tingled on
the cheeks of her passengers from the softer South. Finally, as the
great channel widened out, and the various smaller islands disappeared
behind, Ingram touched his companion on the shoulder, looked over to a
long and low line of rock and hill, and said, "Borva!"
And this was Borva!--nothing visible but an indefinite extent of rocky
shore, with here and there a bay of white sand, and over that a
table-land of green pasture, apparently uninhabited.
"There are not many people on the island," said Lavender, who seemed
rather disappointed with the look of the place.
"There are three hundred," said Mackenzie with the air of one who had
experienced the difficulties of ruling over three hundred islanders.
He had scarcely spoken when his attention was called by Duncan to some
object that the gillie had been regarding for some minutes back.
"Yes, it iss Miss Sheila," said Duncan.
A sort of flush of expectation passed over Lavender's face, and he
sprang to his feet. Ingram laughed. Did the foolish youth fancy he
could see half as far as this gray-eyed, eagle-faced man, who had now
sunk into his accustomed seat by the mast? There was nothing visible to
ordinary eyes but a speck of a boat, with a single sail up, which was
apparently, in the distance, running in for Borva.
"Ay, ay, ay," said Mackenzie in a vexed way, "it is Sheila, true enough;
and what will she do out in the boat at this time, when she wass to be
at home to receive the gentlemen that hef come all the way from London?"
"Well, Mr. Mackenzie," said Lavender, "I should be sorry to think that
our coming had interfered in any way whatever with your daughter's
amusements."
"Amusements!" said the old man with a look of surprise. "It iss not
amusements she will go for: that is no amusements for her. It is for
some teffle of a purpose she will go, when it iss the house that is the
proper place for her, with friends coming from so great a journey."
Presently it became clear that a race between the two boats was
inevitable, both of them making for the same point. Mackenzie would take
no notice of such a thing, but there was a grave smile on Duncan's face,
and something like a look of pride in his keen eyes.
"There iss no one, not one," he said, almost to himself, "will take her
in better than Miss Sheila--not one in ta island. And it wass me tat
learnt her every bit o' ta steering about Borva."
The strangers could now make out that in the other boat there were two
girls--one seated in the stern, the other by the mast. Ingram took out
his handkerchief and waved it: a similar token of recognition was
floated out from the other vessel. But Mackenzie's boat presently had
the better of the wind, and slowly drew on ahead, until, when her
passengers landed on the rude stone quay, they found the other and
smaller craft still some little distance off.
Lavender paid little attention to his luggage. He let Duncan do with it
what he liked. He was watching the small boat coming in, and getting a
little impatient, and perhaps a little nervous, in waiting for a
glimpse of the young lady in the stern. He could vaguely make out that
she had an abundance of dark hair looped up; that she wore a small straw
hat with a short white feather in it; and that, for the rest, she seemed
to be habited entirely in some rough and close-fitting costume of dark
blue. Or was there a glimmer of a band of rose-red round her neck?
The small boat was cleverly run alongside the jetty: Duncan caught her
bow and held her fast, and Miss Sheila, with a heavy string of lythe in
her right hand, stepped, laughing and blushing, on to the quay. Ingram
was there. She dropped the fish on the stones and took his two hands in
hers, and without uttering a word looked a glad welcome into his face.
It was a face capable of saying unwritten things--fine and delicate in
form, and yet full of an abundance of health and good spirits that shone
in the deep gray-blue eyes. Lavender's first emotion was one of surprise
that he should have heard this handsome, well-knit and proud-featured
girl called "little Sheila," and spoken of in a pretty and caressing
way. He thought there was something almost majestic in her figure, in
the poising of her head and the outline of her face. But presently he
began to perceive some singular suggestions of sensitiveness and
meekness in the low, sweet brow, in the short and exquisitely-curved
upper lip, and in the look of the tender blue eyes, which had long black
eyelashes to give them a peculiar and indefinable charm. All this he
noticed hastily and timidly as he heard Ingram, who still held the
girl's hands in his, saying, "Well, Sheila, and you haven't quite
forgotten me? And you are grown such a woman now: why, I mustn't call
you Sheila any more, I think. But let me introduce to you my friend, who
has come all the way from London to see all the wonderful things of
Borva."
If there was any embarrassment or blushing during that simple ceremony,
it was not on the side of the Highland girl, for she frankly shook hands
with him, and said, "And are you very well?"
The second impression which Lavender gathered from her was, that nowhere
in the world was English pronounced so beautifully as in the island of
Lewis. The gentle intonation with which she spoke was so tender and
touching--the slight dwelling on the _e_ in "very" and "well" seemed to
have such a sound of sincerity about it, that he could have fancied he
had been a friend of hers for a lifetime. And if she said "ferry" for
"very," what then? It was the most beautiful English he had ever heard.
The party now moved off toward the shore, above the long white curve of
which Mackenzie's house was visible. The old man himself led the way,
and had, by his silence, apparently not quite forgiven his daughter for
having been absent from home when his guests arrived.
"Now, Sheila," said Ingram, "tell me all about yourself: what have you
been doing?"
"This morning?" said the girl, walking beside him with her hand laid on
his arm, and with the happiest look on her face.
"This morning, to begin with. Did you catch those fish yourself?"
"Oh no, there was no time for that. And it was Mairi and I saw a boat
coming in, and it was going to Mevaig, but we overtook it, and got some
of the fish, and we thought we should be back before you came. However,
it is no matter, since you are here. And you have been very well? And
did you see any difference in Stornoway when you came over?"
Lavender began to think that Styornoway sounded ever so much more
pleasant than mere Stornoway.
"We had not a minute to wait in Stornoway. But tell me, Sheila, all
about Borva and yourself: that is better than Stornoway. How are your
schools getting on? And have you bribed or frightened all the children
into giving up Gaelic yet? How is John the Piper? and does the Free
Church minister still complain of him? And have you caught any more
wild-ducks and tamed them? And are there any gray geese up at
Loch-an-Eilean?"
"Oh, that is too many at once," said Sheila, laughing. "But I am afraid
your friend will find Borva very lonely and dull. There is not much
there at all, for all the lads are away at the Caithness fishing. And
you should have shown him all about Stornoway, and taken him up to the
castle and the beautiful gardens."
"He has seen all sorts of castles, Sheila, and all sorts of gardens in
every part of the world. He has seen everything to be seen in the great
cities and countries that are only names to you. He has traveled in
France, Italy, Russia, Germany, and seen all the big towns that you hear
of in history."
"That is what I should like to do if I were a man," said Sheila; "and
many and many a time I wish I had been a man, that I could go to the
fishing and work in the fields, and then, when I had enough money, go
away and see other countries and strange people."
"But if you were a man, I should not have come all the way from London
to see you," said Ingram, patting the hand that lay on his arm.
"But if I were a man," said the girl, quite frankly, "I should go up to
London to see you."
Mackenzie smiled grimly, and said, "Sheila, it is nonsense you will
talk."
At this moment Sheila turned round and said, "Oh, we have forgotten poor
Mairi. Mairi, why did you not leave the fish for Duncan? They are too
heavy for you. I will carry them to the house?"
But Lavender sprang forward, and insisted on taking possession of the
thick cord with its considerable weight of lythe.
"This is my cousin Mairi," said Sheila; and forthwith the young,
fair-faced, timid-eyed girl shook hands with the gentlemen, and said,
just as if she had been watching Sheila, "And are you ferry well, sir?"
For the rest of the way up to the house Lavender walked by the side of
Sheila; and as the string of lythe had formed the introduction to their
talk, it ran pretty much upon natural history. In about five minutes she
had told him more about sea-birds and fish than ever he knew in his
life; and she wound up this information by offering to take him out on
the following morning, that he might himself catch some lythe.
"But I am a wretchedly bad fisherman, Miss Mackenzie," he said. "It is
some years since I tried to throw a fly."
"Oh, there is no need for good fishing when you catch lythe," she said
earnestly. "You will see Mr. Ingram catch them. It is only a big white
fly you will need, and a long line, and when the fish takes the fly,
down he goes--a great depth. Then when you have got him and he is
killed, you must cut the sides, as you see that is done, and string him
to a rope and trail him behind the boat all the way home. If you do not
do that, it iss no use at all to eat. But if you like the
salmon-fishing, my papa will teach you that. There is no one," she added
proudly, "can catch salmon like my papa--not even Duncan--and the
gentlemen who come in the autumn to Stornoway, they are quite surprised
when my papa goes to fish with them."
"I suppose he is a good shot too," said the young man, amused to notice
the proud way in which the girl spoke of her father.
"Oh, he can shoot anything. He will shoot a seal if he comes up but for
one moment above the water; and all the birds--he will get you all the
birds if you will wish to take any away with you. We have no deer on the
island--it is too small for that--but in the Lewis and in Harris there
are many, many thousands of deer, and my papa has many invitations when
the gentlemen come up in the autumn; and if you look in the game-book of
the lodges, you will see there is not any one who has shot so many deer
as my papa--not any one whatever."
At length they reached the building of dark and rude stone-work, with
its red coping, its spacious porch and its small enclosure of garden in
front. Lavender praised the flowers in this enclosure: he guessed they
were Sheila's particular care; but in truth there was nothing rare or
delicate among the plants growing in this exposed situation. There were
a few clusters of large yellow pansies, a calceolaria or two, plenty of
wallflower, some clove-pinks, and an abundance of sweet-william in all
manner of colors. But the chief beauty of the small garden was a
magnificent tree-fuchsia which grew in front of one of the windows, and
was covered with deep rose-red flowers set amid its small and deep-green
leaves. For the rest, a bit of honeysuckle was trained up one side of
the porch, and at the small wooden gate there were two bushes of
sweetbrier that filled the warm air with fragrance.
Just before entering the house the two strangers turned to have a look
at the spacious landscape lying all around in the perfect calm of a
summer day. And lo! before them there was but a blinding mass of white
that glared upon their eyes, and caused them to see the far sea and the
shores and the hills as but faint shadows appearing through a silvery
haze. A thin fleece of cloud lay across the sun, but the light was
nevertheless so intense that the objects near at hand--a disused boat
lying bottom upward, an immense anchor of foreign make, and some such
things--seemed to be as black as night as they lay on the warm road. But
when the eye got beyond the house and the garden, and the rough hillside
leading down to Loch Roag, all the world appeared to be a blaze of calm,
silent and luminous heat. Suainabhal and its brother mountains were only
as clouds in the south. Along the western horizon the portion of the
Atlantic that could be seen lay like a silent lake under a white sky. To
get any touch of color, they had to turn eastward, and there the
sunlight faintly fell on the green shores of Borva, on the narrows of
Loch Roag, and the loose red sail of a solitary smack that was slowly
coming round a headland. They could hear the sound of the long oars. A
pale line of shadow lay in the wake of the boat, but otherwise the black
hull and the red sail seemed to be coming through a plain of molten
silver. When the young men turned to go into the house the hall seemed a
cavern of impenetrable darkness, and there was a flush of crimson light
dancing before their eyes.
When Ingram had had his room pointed out, Lavender followed him into it
and shut the door.
"By Jove, Ingram," he said, with a singular light of enthusiasm on his
handsome face, "what a beautiful voice that girl has! I have never heard
anything so soft and musical in all my life; and then when she smiles
what perfect teeth she has! And then, you know, there is an appearance,
a style, a grace about her figure--But, I say, do you seriously mean to
tell me you are not in love with her?"
"Of course I am not," said the other impatiently, as he was busily
engaged with his portmanteau.
"Then let me give you a word of information," said the younger man, with
an air of profound shrewdness: "she is in love with you."
Ingram rose with some little touch of vexation on his face: "Look here,
Lavender: I am going to talk to you seriously. I wish you wouldn't fancy
that every one is in that condition of simmering love-making you delight
in. You never were in love, I believe--I doubt whether you ever will
be--but you are always fancying yourself in love, and writing very
pretty verses about it, and painting very pretty heads. I like the
verses and the paintings well enough, however they are come by; but
don't mislead yourself into believing that you know anything whatever of
a real and serious passion by having engaged in all sorts of imaginative
and semi-poetical dreams. It is a much more serious thing than that,
mind you, when it comes to a man. And, for Heaven's sake, don't
attribute any of that sort of sentimental make-believe to either Sheila
Mackenzie or myself. We are not romantic folks. We have no imaginative
gifts whatever, but we are very glad, you know, to be attentive and
grateful to those who have. The fact is, I don't think it quite fair--"
"Let us suppose I am lectured enough" said the other, somewhat stiffly.
"I suppose I am as good a judge of the character of a woman as most
other men, although I am no great student, and have no hard and dried
rules of philosophy at my fingers' ends. Perhaps, however, one may learn
more by mixing with other people and going out into the world than by
sitting in a room with a dozen of books, and persuading one's self that
men and women are to be studied in that fashion."
"Go away, you stupid boy, and unpack your portmanteau, and don't quarrel
with me," said Ingram, putting out on the table some things he had
brought for Sheila; "and if you are friendly with Sheila and treat her
like a human being, instead of trying to put a lot of romance and
sentiment about her, she will teach you more than you could learn in a
hundred drawing-rooms in a thousand years."