"A wee drop?" my uncle insisted, more confidently.
"I'm not used to it, sir," says I.
"That's good," he declared; "that's very good. Give the devil his due,
Dannie: I've fetched ye up very well."
'Twas with delight he challenged a disputation....
* * * * *
After this ceremony I sat with Judith on the peak of the Lost Soul. My
uncle paced the gravelled walk, in the gathering dusk below, whence,
by an ancient courtesy, he might benignantly spy upon the love-making.
We were definite against the lingering twilight: I smiled to catch the
old man pausing in the path with legs spread wide and glowing face
upturned. But I had no smile for the maid, poor child! nor any word to
say, save only to express a tenderness it seemed she would not hear.
'Twas very still in the world: there was no wind stirring, no ripple
upon the darkening water, no step on the roads, no creak of oar-withe,
no call or cry or laugh of humankind, no echo anywhere; and the sunset
clouds trooped up from the rim of the sea with ominous stealth,
throwing off their garments of light as they came, advancing, grim and
gray, upon the shadowy coast. Across the droch, lifted high above the
maid and me, his slender figure black against the pale-green sky,
stood John Cather on the brink of Tom Tulk's cliff, with arms extended
in some ecstasy to the smouldering western fire. A star twinkled
serenely in the depths of space beyond, seeming, in the mystery of
that time, to be set above his forehead; and I was pleased to fancy, I
recall, that 'twas a symbol and omen of his nobility. Thus the maid
and I: thus we four folk, who played the simple comedy--unknowing,
every one, in the departing twilight of that day.
I reproached the maid. "Judith," says I, "you've little enough, it
seems, to say to me."
"There is nothing," she murmured, "for a maid to say."
"There is much," I chided, "for a man to hear."
"Never a word, Dannie, lad," she repeated, "that a maid may tell."