HABET!
Mary went singing through the house: her step free and agile, her face
radiant, her eyes shining with good-humour and the delight of life.
"Kaethchen," she said, one morning, "the proofs of the photographs
should come to-day, and if they turn out well I mean to have the whole
of them enlarged, every one of them, to make a handsome series for Mrs.
Armour. Don't you think they should be very interesting to those people
away over there--'where wild Altama murmurs to their woe'? Woe, indeed!
I wish we could import some of their woeful circumstances into this
neighbourhood. Forty bushels of wheat to the acre: what do you say to
that? A hundred and sixty acres of land for two pounds! I don't like
to think of it, Kaethchen: to tell you the truth, I just hate to hear
Mr. Ross begin and talk about emigration: it all sounds so horribly
reasonable, and practicable, and right. Sometimes I lie awake
convincing myself that the very next day or the next again he will make
his appearance with the announcement that he has decided to go back to
his original intention; and then--then he will say good-bye to
Lochgarra--he and half the people from about here--and be off to the
Gilbert Plains or the Lake Dauphin District----"
"You need not be afraid," said Kaethchen, quietly. "It is neither
wheat-fields nor gold-fields that are likely to allure Mr. Ross.
There's metal more attractive nearer home. By the way, Mamie," she
continued, with a certain significance, "you remember there was a group
taken on the banks of the Connan--and you and Mr. Ross are standing
together. When you get the pictures enlarged, are you going to send any
copies of that one to your friends in the south?"
"Why not?" said she, boldly.
"They may draw conclusions," said Kate Glendinning, looking at her.
"They are welcome to draw a cart-load of conclusions!" she retorted; but
all the same she changed the subject quickly. "Do you know, Kaethchen,
it is quite wonderful how easily things go forward when Donald Ross is
helping me. Look at the wood-carving class--started in a moment,
almost; and that left-handed rascal turning out the cleverest of any of
them. And then he is quite of a mind with me about corrugated iron----"
"You mean Mr. Ross, Mamie?" said Kate, demurely.
"Of course. Quite of a mind with me as to corrugated iron; and I won't
have a square yard of it in the place. If, as he says, thatch takes too
much time and labour, then they may have slates for their roofs, in
place of the turf that I hope to see the last of before I have done with
them; but not an inch of corrugated iron--not an inch. Oh, I tell you
we will have Lochgarra smartened up in course of time, and Minard and
Cruagan too. And I will never rest, Kaethchen, I tell you I will never
rest until Lochgarra has taken the first prize at the Inverness
Exhibition--I mean for the best suit of men's clothes made from the wool
of sheep fed on the croft, and carded, dyed, spun, hand-loom woven, and
cut and sewn in the family. There! It may be a long time yet, but I
mean Lochgarra to have it in the end."
"Oh, but you must not stop at that point," said Kaethchen. "There are a
whole heap of things to be done before you have finally established your
earthly paradise. You must banish all sickness and illness--but
especially rheumatism. You must abolish old age. You must control the
climate to suit the crops. Perhaps you could magnetise the
herring-shoals, and bring them round this way, and ward off storms at
the same time?"
"Kaethchen," said Mary abruptly, "why does he keep harking back on
Manitoba? Don't you think there is a curious tenacity about his
mind?--he does not change plans or opinions quickly. And I know he was
resolved on that emigration scheme. Why does he still talk about
Manitoba? If he really has abandoned that project, why does he still
keep thinking about Portage, and La Prairie, and Brandon? Of course, I
admit that a hundred and sixty acres for two pounds is very tempting;
and forty bushels of wheat to the acre sounds well; and I have no doubt
the emigrants have better clothes, and better food, and better cottages,
and that they don't run such risks from floods and rain. But
still--still there's something about one's own country----"
"You need not be afraid, Mamie," said Kate Glendinning again.
Mary went to the window, and remained there for a minute or two, looking
absently across the wide plain of the sea.
"After all," she said, "it is a very pleasant and comfortable thing to
have a neighbour. Heimra is a good way off; but all the same, if you
knew there was no one living on the island, Lochgarra would be a very
different place, wouldn't it, Kaethchen? And Manitoba! Why, I have seen
it stated that there is a most serious scarcity of water in a great many
of the districts; and that often they have summer frosts that do
incalculable mischief to the grain. So you see it isn't a certainty!"
"No, it is not," said Kaethchen; "but I will tell you what is, Mamie.
It is a certainty, an absolute certainty, that Donald Ross of Heimra
will not go to Manitoba, or to any other corner of Canada, so long as
Mary Stanley is living in Lochgarra."
"Kaethchen," rejoined Mary, a little proudly, "you will go on talking
like that until you believe what you say."
This same afternoon, shortly after luncheon, Mary left the house alone,
which was unusual. She passed down through the village, greeting
everyone, right and left, with a fine cheerfulness; for the weather
still held good, and there was a fair chance for the harvest; while her
individual schemes and industries were doing as well as could be
expected. In fact, the only idle person in the place, apart from the
aged and infirm, appeared to be John the policeman, and him she found by
the bridge that crosses the Garra--no doubt he had been amusing himself
by watching for some lively salmon or sea-trout on its way up the river.
Iain seemed to have grown plumper and more roseate than ever in these
piping times of peace; and the smile with which he greeted the young
proprietress was good-nature itself.
"John," said she, "I want you to tell me something."
"Aw, yes, mem," said the amiable John; and then he added: "but the lads
hef been keeping very quiet."
"So I hear," she answered him. "The Gillie Ciotach says he will smash
the head of anyone that wants to fight; and I suppose that is one way to
stop quarrelling."
John laughed, showing his milk-white teeth.
"A very good weh, too, mem. There's not many would like to hef their
head brokken by the Gillie Ciotach."
"It is not about that I want you to give me some information," said Miss
Stanley. "I want you to tell me if you have been long in this place. I
mean, do you remember the old castle, up there in the loch, before it
was pulled down?"
"Aw, yes, mem, yes, indeed," he made answer. "Who does not remember
Castle Stanley?"
"Oh, nonsense with your Castle Stanley!" she said, angrily. "It never
was Castle Stanley, and never will be Castle Stanley. It was Castle
Heimra; and if I could have my way it would be Castle Heimra again----"
"Aw, yes, mem," said John, anxious to please, "who would be for calling
it Castle Stanley? It is not Castle Stanley at ahl; it's just Castle
Heimra, as it always was--ay, before any one can remember."
"Well, tell me; what size of a place was it before it was pulled down?
Was it a big place?"
"Big!" repeated John, doubtfully, for he did not know which way she
wished to be answered.
"Yes, was it a great ruin?" she went on. "Some of those old castles are
mere towers, you know; and others are great strongholds. What was Castle
Heimra like? Was it as big as Ardvreck?"
Now John had jumped to the conclusion that she wished to have the
ancient glories of Castle Heimra magnified.
"Aw, far bigger nor Ardvreck!" he asserted confidently. "Aw, yes, yes;
far bigger nor Ardvreck. A fearful big place, Castle Heimra--if you had
seen the dingeons, and the towers, and the windows, and everything----"
"Oh, bigger than Ardvreck?" Mary said, with fallen face. And instantly
John perceived that he had erred.
"Aw, no, mem," said he quickly. "Mebbe it was bigger nor Ardvreck at
one time--that is a long time ago, before anyone about here can
remember; but Castle Heimra?--aw, no!--a smahl place, a smahl place,
indeed! There was nothing but the road out to it, when the loch was not
too high flooded; and then the archway, and the dingeon, and the tower.
Castle Heimra!--aw, it's a smahl place was Castle Heimra."
"And do you suppose it could be built up again?" she asked--but rather
to see how far his complaisance would carry him.
"Quite easy!" said John, without a moment's hesitation.
"Why, how do you know?" she demanded. "Are you a builder?"
"The stons are there," John pointed out. "And if they were pulled down,
it is easy to put them back. What has been done once can be done
twice."
"Ah, but it would not be Castle Heimra," Mary said to herself, rather
sadly, as she went on her solitary way.
In course of time she came within view of the desolate expanse of mud
and stones and rushes that had once been Heimra loch; and when she chose
out for herself a seat on a heathery hillock close to the road, there
before her were the tumbled ruins of the stronghold that had withstood
the storms of centuries only to fall before the withering blast of one
man's spite. And as she sate there, alone, in the absolute silence, a
kind of desperation came into her mind. In all other directions there
was hope for her; but here there was none. Elsewhere she could labour,
and patiently wait for fruition; but how was she to drag back the past?
The future had abundant and fair possibilities within it; and she was
naturally sanguine; her happiness consisted in action; and perhaps she
was looking forward to the time when she could say to her lover, 'See,
this is what I have striven to do--for your people: is it well or ill?'
But as between him and her, would there not be ever and always the
consciousness of this black deed that could in no wise be recalled or
atoned for, that could never be forgiven or forgotten? She was not even
allowed to speak: he had declined to hear her shamefaced expressions of
sorrow. Nay, she began to think he was too proud, too implacable, that
he would have no word uttered. And if she went to him and said:
'Donald, do not blame me!--I had no part in it: I would give my right
hand to undo what has been done'--would not his looks still remain
haughty and cold, telling her that she had not ceased to be the
_ban-sassunnach_--a stranger--the enemy of his race and name?
There was a sound of wheels. She started to her feet, for there were
tears in her eyes that she had to hide. The approaching vehicle turned
out to be the mail-car; and on it were Mr. Purdie and Mr. Watson, seated
beside the driver. Both of them raised their hats to her, and would
doubtless have driven on, but that she called to the factor; whereupon
the mail-car was stopped, and Mr. Purdie descended.
"Leave my bag at the inn, Jimmie," he said to the driver, who sent his
horses on again: then the Troich Bheag Dhearg came along to the spot at
which Mary awaited him.
"I wish to speak to you about one or two things, Mr. Purdie," she said,
in a curiously reserved and frigid fashion. "You told me it was under
your direction that the loch here was drained. I do not know whether my
uncle was acting on the advice or suggestion of any one; I can hardly
believe that so insensate a piece of malice could have entered his head
without instigation. And if there was instigation, if this thing was
done out of ill-will towards the Rosses of Heimra, then I say it was a
cowardly blow--a mean, shameless, and cowardly blow!" Her lips were a
little pale; but she was apparently quite calm.
"It was just the thrawn nature of the people about here that brought it
on themselves," said the Little Red Dwarf, sullenly. "The Rosses of
Heimra had no further concern with the loch and the castle, once the
property was sold. They belonged to your uncle: surely it was for him to
say what they should be called? Surely he had the right to do what he
liked with his own?"
"In this instance," said Mary, still preserving that somewhat cold and
distant demeanour, "what he did has got to be undone, as far as that is
now possible. I suppose it would be useless to try and rebuild the
castle. Even if the stones were put up again, it would hardly be Castle
Heimra. But Loch Heimra can be restored to what it used to be; and
since the mischief was done under your direction, Mr. Purdie, you can
now take steps to repair it."
"Bless me, Miss Stanley," the factor protested, "it would be quite
useless--perfectly useless! The loch was never worth anything to
anybody. Salmon cannot get up; and there was nothing in it but a wheen
brown trout----"
"It is not the value of the loch I am considering," she rejoined. "I
wish to make some reparation, as far as I can. And I suppose if those
channels you had cut were partially blocked up, the water from the hills
would soon fill the lake again. Or you could bring the Connan round in
this direction with very little trouble, and let it find its way down to
the Garra after going through the loch----"
"The expense, Miss Stanley!--the expense!"
"I tell you I will have this done, if I have to sell Lochgarra House to
do it!" she said--forgetting for a moment her austere demeanour. The
factor had no further word. Mary went on: "It cannot be a difficult
thing to do, any more than the draining was difficult; and it will give
employment to some of the people, when the harvest is in and the fishing
season over. So you'd better see about it at once, Mr. Purdie; and make
arrangements. And there is to be no more talk of Loch Stanley or of
Castle Stanley either; this is Loch Heimra; and if Castle Heimra has
been pulled down--shamefully and wickedly pulled down--at least there
are the ruins to show where it stood."
The factor remained darkly silent, his vindictive mouth drawn down, his
small eyes morose. And little did she know what gall and wormwood she
had poured into his heart, in directing him to employ those very
Lochgarra people in this work of restoration. However, he made no
further protest: indeed, he endeavoured to assume an air of hopeless
acquiescence--it was his business to obey orders, even if she should
bring the whole estate to waste and ruin.
But as they together set out to return to the village, and as she was
talking over general business affairs with him, explaining what she had
done and what she meant to do, he could not quite conceal his bitter
resentment.
"It seems to me, Miss Stanley, that I am hardly wanted here. A strange
condeetion of affairs. The factor the very last one to be consulted.
And when I think of the way ye allow these people to impose on ye--well,
maybe I'm not so much astonished; for what could one expect?--you come
here an absolute stranger, and you wish to do without them that have
experience of the place, and of course you believe every tale that is
told ye. Though I say it who maybe should not, Lochgarra was a
well-managed estate; everything actually valued, and in order; and the
tenants, large and small, knowing fine that they had to fulfil their
contracts, or take the consequences. But what prevails now? A system
of wholesale charity, as it seems to me. It is giving everything, and
getting nothing. I hope, Miss Stanley," he went on, "ye will not mind
my speaking warmly; for I've done my best for my employers all my life
through; and I cannot be supposed to like other ways and means--which
were never contemplated by the law of the land. If the other
proprietors were to go on as you are doing, there's three-fourths o'
them would be in beggary----"
"It might do them good to try a little of it," said she--which was an
odd speech for the owner of a considerable estate.
"And what has been the result?" he demanded. "What has been gained by
so much sacrifice?"
"Well," said she, "for one thing, the people are more contented. And
they are more friendly towards me. When I came here at first I was
hated; now I am not so much so. Quite friendly most of them are--or, at
least, they appear to be."
"Ay, trust them for that!" said the Little Red Dwarf, scornfully.
"Trust them for that--the cunningest mongrels that ever whined for a
bone! Well they know how to fawn and beslaver, when they're expecting
more and more. I tell ye, Miss Stanley, ye do not understand these
creatures, and it angers me to think that ye are being cheated and
imposed on right and left. Getting more boats and nets?--they'll laugh
at ye, they'll just laugh at ye when ye ask them to pay up the
instalments! And who is your adviser?--a young man who is in secret
league with them--an underhand, conspiring ne'er-do-weel, as cunning as
any one of them, and as treacherous----"
"Mr. Purdie," she said--with a sudden change of tone he did not fail to
note, "what do you mean? I--I beg you to be a little more respectful in
your language."
"It's the old story," said the factor, with affected resignation. "Ye
may work and work, and do the best for your employers; and then some
stranger is called in, new advice is taken, and all you have done is
destroyed. And I wonder if the people will be any the better off. I
wonder what change in their condeetion it will make--what permanent
change, when once you stop putting your hand in your pocket.
Improvements? Oh, yes, yes; improvements are all very fine. But I'm
thinking that spending money on free libraries and the like o' that will
not help them much in getting in their crops."
"As for that," she retorted--but with no displeasure, only a little
quiet confidence, "I can merely say that I am trying to do my best, in a
great many different ways; and the result, whatever it may be, is a long
way off yet. And I live in hope. Of course, there is much more that I
should like to do, and do at once; but I cannot; for I haven't
sufficient money. I don't deny that there is a great deal still to be
amended: I can't work miracles. The people are very poor--and many of
them not too industrious; the soil is bad; the fishing is uncertain; and
communication difficult. I dare say there is even a good deal of
wretchedness--or rather, what a stranger would regard as extreme
wretchedness and misery; but all that cannot be changed in a moment,
even if it turns out that it can be changed at all. And at least there
is little sickness; the poorest cottages have the fresh air blowing
around them--they're better than the London slums, at all events. And
one must just do what one can; and hope for the best."
"I tell ye, ye are going entirely the wrong way to work wi' these
people, Miss Stanley," said he, as they were crossing the bridge and
about to enter the village. "It's my place to tell ye. It's my bounden
duty to tell ye. And I say they are just making sport wi' ye. They are
born beggars; work of any kind is an abomination to them; and you'll
find they'll be like leeches--give, give always; and when you've ruined
the estate on their behalf, what then?"
"I don't see any such prospect--not at present," said Mary, cheerfully.
"Who is likely to know most about them, you or me?" he went on with
dogged persistence. "Who has had most experience of them? Who has had
dealings with them for years and years, and learned their tricks? A
whining, cringing, useless set, cunning as the very mischief, and having
not even an idea of what speaking the truth is. Plausible enough--oh,
ay--plausible with a stranger--especially when they expect to get
anything."
"Mr. Purdie," said Mary, interrupting him, "I presume from your name you
belong to the south of Scotland. Well, I have been told that the
Scotch--the people in the southern half of Scotland--do not understand
the Highland character at all; and cannot understand it, for they have
no sympathy with it. I have been told that the English have far more
sympathy with the Highland nature. And I am English."
"Ay, and who told ye that about the Scotch and the Highlanders?" he
said, suddenly and sharply.
She hesitated for a second.
"It is of little consequence," she answered him. "But I would like to
add this--that denunciations of the inhabitants of a whole country-side
do not seem to me of much value. I suppose human nature is pretty much
the same in Lochgarra as it is elsewhere. And--and--besides, Mr.
Purdie--I do not wish to hear evil spoken of a people amongst whom I
have many friends."
She spoke with some dignity.
"Evil speaking?" said he, with louring eyebrows, "I for one am not given
to evil speaking--or the truth might have been told you ere now."
"The truth?--what truth?" she demanded.
"The truth about one that is too much at your right hand, Miss Stanley,
if I may make bold to say so." At this moment they arrived at the door
of the inn; and she paused, expecting him to leave her; but he said:
"No, I will go on with you as far as Lochgarra House. It is time I
should open my lips at last. I have been patient. I have stood by. I
have heard what has been going on--and I have held my tongue. And
why?--because there are things that it is difficult to speak of to an
unmarried young woman."
Mary was a trifle bewildered. They were walking along through the
village, on this quiet afternoon, with nothing to interrupt the peaceful
stillness save the recurrent plash of the ripples on the beach: it was
hardly the time or the place to be associated with any tragic
disclosure. Moreover, had she heard aright? Was it of Donald Ross he
was speaking?
"And I will say this for myself," the factor continued, "that I warned
ye about the character of that young man, as plainly as I dared--ay, the
very first day ye set foot in the place----"
"You mean Mr. Ross?" said she, lightly. "Pray spare yourself the
trouble, Mr. Purdie. You forget I have had some opportunities of
studying Mr. Ross's character. I know him a little. What did you
say?--that you had something to tell? Oh, no; don't give yourself the
trouble. I know him a little."
"You do not know him at all!" he said, with a vehemence that startled
her. "I tell ye there is not one in this place who would dare to tell
ye the story; and would I, unless I was bound to do it? If there was a
married woman at Lochgarra House, it's to her I would go; and she would
tell ye; but I say it is my bounden duty to speak--and to speak
plainly----"
"Mr. Purdie, I do not wish to hear," she said, with some touch of alarm.
"But ye must hear," he said, with set lips and slow, emphatic utterance.
"Ye are bound to hear--and to understand the character of the man ye are
publicly associating yourself with. A scoundrel of that kind has no
right to be going about with a virtuous and respectable young woman----"
"Mr. Purdie," she said, hurriedly, "I don't want to know--I don't
believe--I wouldn't believe----"
"Miss Stanley," he said, with measured deliberation, "ye have some
knowledge of that poor half-witted creature they call Anna Chlannach.
But did it never occur to ye to ask how she came to lose her reason?
Ay, but if ye had asked, they would not have told ye; there's not one o'
them about here but would lie through thick and thin to screen that
scapegrace; and what then would be the use o' your asking? But I can
tell ye; and I say it's my bounden duty to speak, if there's none else
here to warn ye. And there is my witness--there is the living witness
to that scoundrel's licentiousness and wicked cruelty: go to her--ask
herself--ask her what makes her wander about the shore watching for him,
looking out to Heimra as if the ill he has done her could now be
repaired. The poor lass, betrayed, deserted: no wonder she lost her
reason--ay, and it's a good thing the currents along this coast are
strong, or I'm thinking there might have been a trial for infanticide as
well----"
Mary heard no more: she did not know that he was still talking to her;
she did not know that he accompanied her almost to the house, where he
left her. For--after the first fierce and indignant denial that
involuntarily rushed to her mind--what she saw before her burning eyes
was a series of visions, each of them of the most terrible distinctness,
and all of them related in some ghastly way to this story she had just
been told. What were these things, then, that seemed to sear her very
eyeballs? She saw the little harbour of Camus Bheag; she saw the figure
of a young girl rocking herself in an utter abandonment of misery and
despair; she saw piteous hands held out; she heard that heart-broken
wail piercing the silence as the boat made slowly away for Eilean
Heimra. And then again she was on the heights above the Garra, and
looking down upon the bridge. Those two there?--she had taken them for
lovers--she had called Kaethchen's attention--it was a pretty scene.
Then the sudden, swift disappearance of the girl into the woods; and the
young man's easy, confident professions: all those things grew manifest
before her with an appalling clearness; a blinding light burned upon
them. Nay, her very first interview with Anna Chlannach came back to
startle her: she remembered the poor demented girl wandering among the
rocks, all her intelligible talk being about Heimra: she remembered her
being easily persuaded to walk towards the house; she remembered, too,
how Anna Chlannach fled in terror the moment she came in sight of the
stranger who knew her history. What hideous tale was it that seemed to
summon up these scenes, appealing to them for corroboration? What was
it they seemed to say was true--true as if written up before her in
letters of fire?
There was no time for her to reason or think. For here, as it chanced,
was this very man--this Donald Ross--coming down the wide steps from her
own door. And all her soul was in revolt. Her wounded pride--her sense
of humiliation--scorched her like flame. How had this man dared to lift
his eyes to her? Unabashed he had come into the same room with her--he
had breathed the same air--he had touched her hand: a contamination that
was a poisoned sting. And the people of Lochgarra, who had seen him and
her walking together: were they cognisant of his low amours? They had
wagged their heads, perhaps? They had looked the one to the other?
"I half-expected to meet you," said Donald Ross.
There was no answer. But Mary Stanley did not lower her head, or avert
her face; she was too proud for that; her heart might be beating as
though it would burst its prison, but to all outward appearance she was
quite unmoved. She passed him, pale and cold and silent; and he stood
on one side, looking at her, without a word. She went into the house;
she took no notice of Kaethchen, who was still in the hall; she made for
her own room, and locked herself in there--voiceless, tearless, with all
the fair fabric of her life, its aims, and dreams, and ideals, its still
more secret and trembling hopes, become suddenly and at one blow a
tragic desolation of wreckage and ruin.