When the curious and the inefficient dropped away, as they did by
degrees as night fell, there were left the three youths from the yacht,
Hamish, Duncan, and two or three men from the village, enough to do a
greater work than that which lay before them; but the darkness and the
consternation, and even their very eagerness and anxiety, confused their
proceedings. Such lamps as they could get from Macalister were fastened
up among the heaps of ruin, and made a series of wild Rembrandt-like
pictures in the gloom, but afforded little guidance to their work. The
masses of masonry which they laboured to clear away seemed to increase
rather than diminish under their picks and spades--new angles of the
wall giving way when they seemed to have come nearly to the foundation.
And now and then from above a mass of stones penetrated through and
through by the fire, and kept in their place only by mere balance, would
topple down without warning, dangerously near their heads, risking the
very lives of the workers; upon whom discouragement gained as the night
wore on, and no result was obtained. After a while, with a mournful
unanimity they stopped work and consulted in whispers what was to be
done. Not a sound had replied to their cries. They had stopped a hundred
times to listen, one more imaginative than the rest, thinking he heard
an answering cry; but no such response had ever come, how was it
possible, from under the choking, suffocating mass, which rolled down
upon them as they worked, almost stopping their breath? They gave up
altogether in the middle of the night in dejection and hopelessness. The
moon had risen and shone all round them, appearing through the great
chasms in the wall, making a glory upon the loch, but lending no help
here, the shadow of the lower part of the house lying black over the
new-made ruin. What was the use? They stood disconsolately consulting
over the possibilities. If Walter and Oona were under those heaps of
ruin, it was impossible that they could be alive, and the men asked each
other, shaking their heads, what chance there was of any of those
fortunate accidents which sometimes save the victims of such a calamity.
The wall had been already worn by time, there were no beams, no archways
which could have sheltered them--everything had come down in one mass of
ruin. After many and troubled discussions they prepared reluctantly to
abandon the hopeless work. "Perhaps, in the morning"--it was all that
any one could say. The young yachtsmen made a last effort, calling out
Walter's name. "If you can speak, for God's sake speak? any sign and
we'll have you out. Erradeen! Erradeen!" they cried. But the silence was
as that of the grave. A fall of powdery fragments now and then from the
heap, sometimes a great stone solemnly bounding downwards from point to
point, the light blown about by the night air lighting up the dark
group, and the solitary figure of Hamish, apart from them, who was
working with a sort of rage, never pausing, pulling away the stones with
his hands. This was all; not a moan, not a cry, not a sound of existence
under those shapeless piles of ruin. The only thing that broke the
silence, and which came now with a heartrending monotony, almost
mechanical, was the cry of "Oona! Oona!" which Oona's mother, scarcely
conscious, sent out into the night.
The men stole softly round the corner of the house which remained
untouched, to get to their boats, stealing away like culprits, though
there was no want of goodwill in them. But they were not prepared for
the scene that met them there. The little platform before the door, and
the landing-place, were bright almost as day with the shining of the
moon, the water one sheet of silver, upon which the boats lay black, the
grassy space below all white and clear. In the midst of this space,
seated on a stone, was Mrs. Methven. She had scarcely stirred all night.
Her companion in sorrow had been taken into the shelter of the house,
but she, unknown and half-forgotten, and strong with all the vigour of
misery, had remained there, avoiding speech of any one. With all her
senses absorbed in listening, not a stroke had escaped her, scarcely a
word--for a long time she had stood and walked about, not asking a
question, observing, seeing, hearing all that was done. But as the awful
hours went on, she had dropped down upon this rough seat, little
elevated above the ground, where her figure now struck the troubled gaze
of the young men, as if it had been that of a sentinel watching to see
that they did not abandon their work. No such thought was in her mind.
She was conscious of every movement they had made. For a moment she had
thought that their call upon her son meant that they had found some
trace of him--but that was a mere instantaneous thrill, which her
understanding was too clear to continue to entertain. She had said to
herself from the beginning that there was no hope; she had said from the
first what the men had said to each other reluctantly after hours of
exertion. What was the good? since nothing could be done. Yet all the
while as she said this, she was nursing within her bosom, concealing it
even from her own consciousness, covering up the smouldering dying fire
in her heart, a hope that would not altogether die. She would not even
go towards the workers when they called out her son's name to know what
it was; but only waited, waited with a desperate, secret, half-heathen
thought, that perhaps if she did not cry and importune, but was silent,
letting God do what He would, He might yet relent and bring her back
her boy. Oh be patient! put on at least the guise of patience! and
perhaps He would be touched by the silence of her misery--He who had not
heard her prayers.
She sat going over a hundred things in her heart. That Walter should
have come back to her, called her to him, opened his heart to her, as a
preparation for being thus snatched from her for ever! She said to
herself that by-and-by she would thank God for this great mercy, and
that she had thus found her son again if only for two days: but in the
mean time her heart bled all the more for the thought, and bereavement
became more impossible, more intolerable, even from that, which
afterwards would make it almost sweet. As she kept that terrible vigil
and heard the sound of the implements with which--oh, what was it?--not
him, his body, the mangled remains of him, were being sought, she seemed
to see him, standing before her, leaning upon her, the strong on the
weak, pouring his troubles into her bosom--as he had not done since he
was a child; and now he was lying crushed beneath those stones. Oh no,
no, Oh no, no--it was not possible. God was not like that, holding the
cup of blessing to a woman's lips and then snatching it away. And then
with an effort she would say to herself what she had said from the
first, what she had never wavered in saying, that there was no hope. How
could there be any hope? crushed beneath tons of falling stones--oh,
crushed out of recognition, out of humanity! her imagination spared her
nothing. When they found him they would tell her it was better, better,
she the mother that bore him, that she should not see him again. And all
the while the moon shining and God looking on. She was callous to the
cry that came continually, mechanically, now stronger, now fainter, from
the rooms above. "Oona, Oona!" Sometimes it made her impatient. Why
should the woman cry, as if her voice could reach her child under those
masses of ruin? And _she_ could not cry who had lost her all! her only
one! why should the other have that relief and she none--nor any hope?
But all the sounds about her caught her ear with a feverish
distinctness. When she heard the steps approaching after the pause of
which she had divined the meaning, they seemed to go over her heart,
treading it down into the dust. She raised her head and looked at them
as they came up, most of the band stealing behind to escape her eye. "I
heard you," she said, "call--my son."
"It was only to try; it was to make an effort; it was a last chance."
"A last----" though she was so composed there was a catch in her breath
as she repeated this word; but she added, with the quiet of despair,
"You are going away?"
The young man who was the spokesman stood before her like a culprit with
his cap in his hand.
"My brothers and I," he said, "would gladly stay if it was any use; but
there is no light to work by, and I fear--I fear--that by this time----"
"There is no more hope?" she said. "I have no hope. I never had any
hope."
The young man turned away with a despairing gesture, and then returned
to her humbly, as if she had been a queen.
"We are all grieved--more grieved than words can say: and gladly would
we stay if we could be of any use. But what can we do? for we are all
convinced--"
"No me," cried Hamish, coming forward in the moonlight. "No me!" his
bleeding hands left marks on his forehead as he wiped the heavy moisture
from it; his eyes shone wildly beneath his shaggy brows. "I was against
it," he cried, "from the first! I said what would they be doing here?
But convinced, that I never will be, no till I find--Mem, if ye tell
them they'll bide. Tell them to bide. As sure as God is in heaven that
was all her thought--we will find her yet."
The other men had slunk away, and were softly getting into their boats.
The three young yachtsmen alone waited, a group of dark figures about
her. She looked up at them standing together in the moonlight, her face
hollowed out as if by the work of years.
"He is my only one," she said, "my only one. And you--you--you are all
the sons of one mother."
Her voice had a shrill anguish in it, insupportable to hear: and when
she paused there came still more shrilly into the air, with a renewed
passion, "Oona! Oona!" the cry that had not ceased for hours. The young
man who was called Patrick flung his clenched hand into the air; he gave
a cry of pity and pain unendurable.
"Go and lie down for an hour or two," he said to the others, "and come
back with the dawn. Don't say a word. I'll stay; it's more than a man
can bear."
When the others were gone, this young fellow implored the poor lady to
go in, to lie down a little, to try and take some rest. What good could
she do? he faltered; and she might want all her strength for
to-morrow--using all those familiar pleas with which the miserable are
mocked. Something like a smile came over her wan face.
"You are very kind," she said, "oh very kind!" but no more. But when he
returned and pressed the same arguments upon her she turned away almost
with impatience. "I will watch with my son to-night," she said, putting
him away with her hand. And thus the night passed.
Mrs. Forrester had been taken only half-conscious into Walter's room
early in the evening. Her cry had become almost mechanical, not to be
stopped; but she, it was hoped, was but half aware of what was passing,
the unwonted and incredible anguish having exhausted her simple being,
unfamiliar with suffering. Mr. Cameron, the minister from the village,
had come over on the first news, and Mysie from the isle to take care
of her mistress. Together they kept watch over the poor mother, who lay
sometimes with her eyes half closed in a sort of stupor, sometimes
springing up wildly, to go to Oona who was ill, and wanting her, she
cried, distraught. "Oona! Oona!" she continued to cry through all. Mysie
had removed her bonnet, and her light faded hair was all dishevelled,
without the decent covering of the habitual cap, her pretty colour gone.
Sorrow seems to lie harder on such a gentle soul. It is cruel. There is
nothing in it that is akin to the mild level of a being so easy and
common. It was torture that prostrated the soul--not the passion of love
and anguish which gave to the other mother the power of absolute
self-control, and strength which could endure all things. Mr. Cameron
himself, struck to the heart, for Oona was as dear to him as a child of
his own, restrained his longing to be out among the workers in order to
soothe and subdue her; and though she scarcely understood what he was
saying, his presence did soothe her. It was natural that the minister
should be there, holding her up in this fiery passage, though she could
not tell why.
And thus the night went on. The moonlight faded outside; the candles
paled and took a sickly hue within as the blue dawn came stealing over
the world. At that chillest, most awful moment of all the circle of
time, Mrs. Forrester had sunk into half-unconsciousness. She was not
asleep, but exhaustion had almost done the part of sleep, and she lay
on the sofa in a stupor, not moving, and for the first time intermitting
her terrible cry. The minister stole down-stairs in that moment of
repose. He was himself an old man and shaken beyond measure by the
incidents of the night. His heart was bleeding for the child of his
spirit, the young creature to whom he had been tutor, counsellor, almost
father from her childhood. He went out with his heart full, feeling the
vigil insupportable in the miserable room above, yet almost less
supportable when he came out to the company of the grey hills growing
visible, a stern circle of spectators round about, and realised with a
still deeper pang the terrible unmitigated fact of the catastrophe. It
was with horror that he saw the other mother sitting patient upon the
stone outside. He did not know her, and had forgotten that such a person
existed as Lord Erradeen's mother. Had she been there all night? "God
help us," he said to himself; "how selfish we are, even to the sharers
of our calamity." She looked up at him as he passed, but said nothing.
And what could he say to her? For the first time he behaved himself like
a coward, and fled from duty and kindness; for what could he say to
comfort her? and why insult her misery with vain attempts? Young Patrick
had pressed shelter and rest upon her, being young and knowing no
better. But the minister could not tell Walter's mother to lie down and
rest, to think of her own life. What was her life to her? He passed her
by with the acute and aching sympathy which bears a share of the
suffering it cannot relieve. And his own suffering was sore. Oona, Oona,
he cried to himself silently in his heart as her mother had done
aloud--his child, his nursling, the flower of his flock. Mysie had told
him in the intervals, when her mistress was quiet, in whispers and with
tears, of all that had happened lately, and of Oona's face that was like
the Sabbath of the Sacrament, so grave yet so smiling as she left the
isle. This went to the old minister's heart. He passed the ruin where
Hamish was still plucking uselessly, half-stupefied, at the stones, and
Patrick, with his back against the unbroken wall, had fallen asleep in
utter weariness. Mr. Cameron did not linger there, but sought a place
out of sight of man, where he could weep: for he was old, and his heart
was too full to do without some natural relief.
He went through the ruined doorway to a place where all was still green
and intact, as it had been before the explosion; the walls standing, but
trees grown in the deep soil which covered the old stone floor. He
leaned his white head against the roughness of the wall, and shed the
tears that made his old eyes heavy, and relieved his old heart with
prayer. He had prayed much all the night through, but with distracted
thoughts, and eyes bent upon the broken-hearted creature by whose side
he watched. But now he was alone with the great and closest Friend, He
to whom all things can be said, and who understands all. "Give us
strength to resign her to Thee," he said, pressing his old cheek
against the damp and cold freshness of the stones, which were wet with
other dews than those of nature, with the few concentrated tears of age,
that mortal dew of suffering. The prayer and the tears relieved his
soul. He lifted his head from the wall, and turned to go back again--if,
perhaps, now fresh from his Master's presence he might find a word to
say to the other woman who all night long, like Rizpah, had sat silent
and watched her son.
But as he turned to go away it seemed to the minister that he heard a
faint sound. He supposed nothing but that one of the men who had been
working had gone to sleep in a corner, and was waking and stirring to
the daylight. He looked round, but saw no one. Perhaps, even, there came
across the old man's mind some recollection of the tales of mystery
connected with this house; but in the presence of death and sorrow, he
put these lesser wonders aside. Nevertheless, there was a sound, faint,
but yet of something human. The old stone floor was deep under layers of
soil upon which every kind of herbage and even trees grew; but in the
corner of the wall against which he had been leaning, the gathered soil
had been hollowed away by the droppings from above, and a few inches of
the original floor was exposed. The old man's heart began to beat with a
bewildering possibility: but he dared not allow himself to think of it:
he said to himself, but it must be a bird, a beast, something imprisoned
in some crevice. He listened. God! was that a moan? He turned and
rushed, with the step of a boy, to where Patrick sat dozing, and Hamish,
stupefied, worked on mechanically. He clutched the one out of his sleep,
the other from his trance of exhaustion--"Come here! come here! and
listen. What is this?" the old minister said.