Borson urged him to stay until the summer fishing was over; but
Liot was possessed by the sole idea of getting away, and he would
listen to nothing that interfered with this determination. He
owned half the boat in which he fished, and as it was just at the
beginning of the season he was obliged to buy the other half at an
exorbitant price. But the usually prudent man would make no delays;
he paid the price asked, and then quickly prepared the boat for
the voyage he contemplated.
One night after David was asleep he carried him on board of her;
and Paul divined his purpose, though it was unspoken. He walked
with him to the boat, and they smoked their last pipe together in
the moonlight on her deck, and were both very silent. Paul had told
himself that he had a great deal to say to his cousin, yet when
it came to the last hour they found themselves unable to talk. At
midnight both men stood up.
"The tide serves," said Liot, softly, holding out his hand.
And Paul clasped it and answered: "God be with thee, Liot."
"We shall meet no more in this life, Paul."
"Then I tryst thee for the next life; that will be a good meeting.
Fare thee well. God keep thee!"
[Illustration: "THE WATERS OF THE GREAT DEEP."]
"And thee also."
"Then we shall be well kept, both of us."
That was the last of Shetland for Liot Borson. He watched his kinsman
out of sight, and then lifted his anchor, and in the silence and
moonlight went out to sea. When the Lerwick people awoke in the
morning Liot was miles and miles away. He was soon forgotten. It
was understood that he would never come back, and there was no more
interest in him than there is in the dead. Like them, he had had
his time of sojourn, and his place knew him no more.
As for Liot, he was happy. He set his sails, and covered David more
warmly, and then lay down under the midnight stars. The wind was at
his back, and the lonely land of his birth passed from his eyes as a
dream passes. In the morning the islands were not to be seen; they
were hidden by belts of phantom foam, wreathed and vexed with spray
and spindrift. There was, fortunately, no wrath in the morning
tide, only a steady, irresistible set to the westward; and this was
just what Liot desired. For many days these favorable circumstances
continued, and Liot and David were very happy together; but as they
neared the vexed seas which lash Cape Wrath and pour down into the
North Minch, Liot had enough to do to keep his boat afloat.
He was driven against his will and way almost to the Butt of Lewis;
and as his meal and water were very low, he looked for death in
more ways than one. Then the north wind came, and he hoped to reach
the broad Bay of Stornoway with it; but it was soon so strong and
savage that nothing could be done but make all snug as possible
for the gale and then run before it. It proved to be worse than
Liot anticipated, and, hungry and thirsty and utterly worn out,
the helpless boat and her two dying occupants were picked up by some
Celtic coasters from Uig, and taken to the little hamlet to which
they were going.
There Liot stayed all summer, fishing with the men of the place;
but he was not happy, for, though they were Calvinists as to faith,
they were very different from the fair, generous, romantic men of
his own islands. For the fishers of Uig were heavy-faced Celts,
with the impatient look of men selfish and greedy of gain. They
made Liot pay well for such privileges as they gave him; and he
looked forward to the close of the fishing season, for then he was
determined to go to Stornoway and get David a more comfortable and
civilized home, after which he would sell his boat and nets. And
then? Then he would take the first passage he could get to Glasgow,
for at Glasgow there were ships bound for every port in the world.
It was on the 5th of September that he again set sail for Stornoway,
and on the 11th he was once more brought back to Uig. A great storm
had stripped him of everything he possessed but his disabled boat.
David was in a helpless, senseless condition, and Liot had a broken
arm, and fainted from suffering and exhaustion while he was being
carried on shore. In some way he lost his purse, and it contained all
his money. He looked at the sea and he looked at the men, and he
knew not which had it. So there was nothing possible for another
winter but poverty and hard toil, and perchance a little hope,
now and then, of a better voyage in the spring.
With endless labor and patience he prepared for this third attempt,
and one lovely day in early June set sail for the Butt of Lewis. He
had good weather and fair winds for two days; then the norther
came and drove him round Vatternish, and into the dangerous
whirlpools and vexed waterways of that locality. His boat began to
leak, and he was forced to abandon her, and for thirty hours to
thole the blustering winds and waves that tossed the little
cockle-shell, in which they took a last refuge, like a straw
upon the billows. Again the men of Uig brought them to shore; and
this time they were sulky, and expressed no sympathy for Liot's
disappointment, loss, and suffering. They had become superstitious
about him, and they speculated and wondered at the ill luck that
always drove him back to Skye. Roy Hunish, a very old man, spoke for
the rest when he said, "It seems to me, Liot Borson, that the Lord
has not sent you to Stornoway; he is against the journey." And
Liot answered sadly: "He is against all I desire."
When they had been warmed and fed and rested in one of the nearest
cottages, Liot took David in his arms and went back to his old hut.
He put the sleeping child in the bunk, and then sat down on the
cold, dark hearthstone. What Hunish expressed so plainly was the
underlying thought in his own heart. He could not escape from a
conclusion so tragically manifested. In sorrow too great for
tears, he compelled himself to resign all his hopes and dreams--a
renunciation as bitter as wormwood, but not as cruelly bitter as
the one it included; for his rejection was also the rejection of
his son. God had not forgiven him, nor had he accepted David's
dedication to his service, for he had stripped him of all means
to accomplish it. He might have permitted him to reach Stornoway and
leave the boy among his kindred; he had chosen rather to include
David in the sin of his father. This was the thought that wounded
his heart like a sword. He went to the sleeping boy and kissed his
face, weeping most of all for the sorrow he had brought on the
innocent one.
If this earth be a penal world, Liot that night went down to one of
its lowest hells. Sorrow of many kinds brutally assailed him. He
hid nothing from his consciousness. He compelled himself to see
over again the drowning of Bele--that irreparable wrong which had
ruined all his happiness; he compelled himself to stand once more by
Karen's coffin, and listen to his own voice calling God to witness
his innocence; he compelled himself to admit that he had thought God
had forgotten his sin of seven years ago. And when these things had
been thought out to the end, his heart was so full that he quite
unconsciously gave utterance to his thoughts in audible speech. The
tones of his voice in the darkness were like those of a man praying,
and the hopeless words filled the sorrowful room with a sense of
suffering:
"So, then, it is for a life-sentence that I am sent here. There is
to be no pardon till I have dreed out the years appointed me in the
gust and poverty of this dreadful place, among its hard, unfriendly
men. My God! I am but thirty-three years old. How long wilt thou be
angry with me? And the little lad! Pass me by, but oh, be merciful to
him!"
A great silence followed this imploration. The man was waiting. For
hours he sat motionless; but just before dawn he must have heard
a word of strength or comfort, for he rose to his feet and bowed
his head. He was weeping bitterly, and his voice was like a sob; but
from that hut on the wild Skye coast there arose with a heartbroken
cry the sublimest of mortal prayers--"_Thy will be done._"
IV
THE DOOR WIDE OPEN
Resignation is not always contentment, and though Liot accepted
God's will in place of his own will, he took it rather with a dour
patience than with a cheerful satisfaction. Yet in a certain way
life gets made independent of our efforts. A higher power than our
own brings events about, finds a way across the hills of difficulty,
smooths out the rough places, and makes straight what our folly
has made crooked. When it became certain that Liot would make
his life-home near Uig the men on that coast began to treat him with
more friendliness, and the women pitied and cared a little for his
motherless boy. And by and by there came a new minister, who found
in Liot a man after his own heart. The two men became familiars,
and the friendship made life more supportable to both.
It was a hard existence, however, for the child. Liot loved his son,
but he was not a demonstrative father, and he thought more of doing
his duty to David than of showing him affection or providing him
with pleasure. For when all hopes of making him a minister were
over David lost something in Liot's estimation. He was, then, just
a common lad, in whose heart, as a matter of course, folly and
disobedience were bound up. It was his place to exorcise everything
like joy, and with the phantoms of a gloomy creed to darken and
terrify his childhood.
Before David had shed his baby teeth, hell and the devil were
tremendous realities to him. An immaculate, pitiless God, who
delighted in taking vengeance on his enemies, haunted all his
boyhood's dreams; and the "scheme of salvation," by which perchance
this implacable Deity might be conciliated, was the beginning and
the end of his education. With an amazing distinctness in question
and answer, this "scheme" was laid before him, and by the word
and the rod of admonition he was made familiar with the letter of its
awful law.
Here, then, was a child whom a sad destiny had led far away from
happiness. His nature was singularly affectionate, yet he had no
memory of a mother's kiss, or, indeed, of any tender human kindness.
No one petted or loved him; no one heeded his childish sorrows and
sufferings. He had toothaches and earaches, about which he felt it
useless to speak. He went into the boats with his father as soon as
he could bait a line, and was forced to endure all that men endured
from salt-water boils, chilblains, frost-bites, and the lashing
of spray-laden winds. Cold and hunger, heat and thirst, and the
frequent intolerable sleepiness of overtaxed strength made up the
sad drama of his childhood; and he played his part in it with a
patient submission that sometimes won from his father astonishment
and a few words of praise or admiration.
Such words made glorious epochs in the boy's life; he could remember
every one of them. Once, when Liot could get no one to launch a boat
and go with him to the help of four men drowning before their eyes,
the ten-year-old lad came radiantly forward and said, "Take me,
father; I will go with you." And the two went on the desperate
errand together, and brought back safely the men ready to perish.
Then, when all was well over and the child stood trembling with
exhaustion, Liot drew him close to his side, and pushed his wet
hair from his brow, and said with proud tenderness, "You are a
good, brave boy. God bless you, David!" And the happy upward look of
the child had his mother's smile in it, and before Liot knew what he
was doing he had stooped and kissed him. The event was a wonderful
one, and it made a tie between the father and the son that it was
beyond the power of time to loosen.
Liot's own boyhood had been filled with the dreams and stories
of the elder world. He had been conscious all his life of this
influence streaming up from the centuries behind him, and coloring,
and even moving, his present existence. The fierce hatred he felt
for Bele Trenby came from unchristened ancestors, and the dumb
murder, which had darkened his life and sent him to Uig, from the
same source. He told David none of these stirring sagas. He was
resolved that the knowledge of the thrall's curse should not call
sorrow to him. He never named the heroic Gisli in his hearing.
And once, when he found an old fisherman reciting "Ossian" to
David, he fell into such anger as terrified every one. Indeed, he
said words at that hour which would have made much trouble and
ill-will if the minister had not justified them and called Liot's
anger a "righteous one."
And in those days there was absolutely no literature for the people.
Books were dear and scarce; ten years might pass without a new one
drifting into a hamlet; and newspapers were few and for the rich
alone. David, then, had but one book--the Holy Scriptures. He
read them, and read them again, and found everything in them.
Fortunately, the wonderful wisdom and stories of the Apocrypha had
not then been discarded; the book had its place between the Old
and the New Testament. And David was wise with Solomon, and saw
beautiful visions with Esdras, and lived and glowed and fought with
the heroic Maccabees.
And we who have far more books than we can read can hardly
understand how David loved the Bible. It was his poetry, his
philosophy, his history; it was, above all, the speech of God to man.
Through it he breathed the air of the old, old East, and grew up
under the shadows of Judea's palms and olives; so that the rainy
gloom of the coast of Skye was but an accident of his existence.
Abraham and Joseph, Moses and Joshua, were far more real personages
to David Borson than the Duke of Wellington or Napoleon and his
twelve marshals. Through the stormy days when it was impossible to go
to sea, and in the long winter nights, when he stretched himself
before the red peats with a little oil-cruse, he and the Bible
were friends and companions. It kept him in direct relation with
God and heaven; it fed him on faith; it made him subject to duty; it
gave him a character at once courageous and gentle, calm and
ideal--such a character as is very rare in our days, and which,
where it does exist, will _not_ be transmitted.
So that, with all his hard work and many deprivations, David had
his happy hours. And the years went by, and he grew up to a fair and
stately manhood, not rebelling against his fate, but taking it as
a part of the inscrutable mystery of life and death constantly
before his eyes. Others around him suffered in like manner, and at
the end one thing happened to all. No; it was not the tyranny of
nature nor of his material life that troubled David as he approached
manhood; it was the spiritual tyranny under which he lived and
prayed which darkened his days and filled his nights with thoughts
which he dared not follow to their proper conclusion and was equally
afraid to dismiss.
This was his dilemma. He had been taught by a father whom he trusted
implicitly that life was only a short and precarious opportunity
for working out his salvation with fear and trembling; peradventure
he might be counted among the remnant whom God would elect to
save from eternal misery. And in a measure the constant east
winds and cloudy heavens, the cold and stormy seas, and the gloom
and poverty of all his surroundings were so many confirmations of
this unhappy conviction. Yet it was very hard for him to believe
that the God of the Bible, "like a father pitying his children,"
was the God of his Shorter and Longer Catechisms. As his twentieth
year approached these doubts and questions would not be put away,
and yet he dared not speak of them either to the minister or to his
father.
Then, one night, as he was watching his lines and hooks, something
happened which broke the adamantine seal upon his soul. He was quite
alone in his boat, and she was drifting slowly under the full moon;
there was not a sound upon the ocean but the wash of the water
against her sides. He was sitting motionless, thinking of the sadness
and weariness of life, and wishing that God would love him, though
ever so little, and, above all, that he would give him some word or
sign of his care for him. His hands were clasped upon his knees,
his eyes fixed on the far horizon; between him and the God whom he so
ignorantly feared and desired there was apparently infinite space and
infinite silence.
All at once some one seemed to come into the boat beside him. An
ineffable peace and tenderness, a sweetness not to be described,
encompassed the lonely youth. He was sensible of a glory he could
not see; he was comforted by words that were inaudible to his natural
ears. During this transitory experience he scarcely breathed, but as
it slowly passed away he rose reverently to his feet. "An angel has
been with me," he thought.
After this event the whole fabric of his creed vanished at times
before the inexplicable revelation. Yet the terrible power of early
impressions is not easily eradicated, even by the supernatural; and
whenever he reasoned about the circumstance he came to the conclusion
that it might have been a snare and a delusion of the Evil One. For
why should an angel be sent with a word to him? or why should he dare
to hope that his longing after God's love had touched the heart of
the Eternal? Yet, though the glory was dissolved by the doubting,
nothing could quite rob him of his blessing; in the midst of the
sternest realities of his rough daily toil he found himself musing
on those wonderful days when angels went and came among men as
they threshed their wheat or worked at their handicrafts, when
prayer was visibly answered and the fire dropped from heaven on the
accepted sacrifice.
He thought the more on this subject because his father was visibly
dying from some internal disease, which was dissolving with rapid,
inexorable suffering the house of clay in which the soul of Liot
Borson dwelt. Liot was aware of it, and had borne with silent
courage the enemy's advances toward the citadel of life. Very
reluctantly he had given up his duties one by one, until the day came
when nothing remained for him to do but to wait and to suffer; then
he spoke plainly to David. It happened to be the lad's twenty-sixth
birthday, and Liot had his own memories of the first one. Almost
inadvertently the name of Karen passed his lips, and then he talked
long of her goodness, her love, and her beauty; and David listened
with an interest that tempted more confidence than Liot had ever
thought to give.
"If you had such a wife as Karen Sabiston was to me," he said, "then,
David, you would be happy even in this place. But you will not stay
here. When I am gone away to the land very far off, then you will go
back to Shetland--to your own land and your own people."
"I will do as you wish, father."
"You will marry; that is to be looked for. I have seen that girl
of Talisker's watching you, and luring you with her sly smiles
and glances. Give her no notice. I like not these Celtic women,
with their round black eyes and their red color and black hair. In
Shetland you will see women that you may safely love--good and
beautiful girls of your own race; there must be no strange women
among the Borsons. Your Bible tells you what sorrow comes from
marrying daughters of Heth and their like. Go to Shetland for your
wife."
"I will, father."
"You will find friends and kindred there--my good cousin Paul, and
his sons and daughters, and your mother's family in Yell, and Matilda
Sabiston. I would say something of her, but she is doubtless in the
grave by this time, and gone to the mercy of the Merciful."
"Was she of our kindred, then?"
"Of your mother's kin. They were ill friends here, but yonder all
may--all _will_ be different."
During this conversation Liot made his son understand that the
messenger of release might come at any hour; but in the morning he
felt so free from pain that David thought he could safely go to
the early fishing. When he reached the pier, however, the boat had
sailed without him, and he walked into Uig and told the minister
how near the end it was. And the minister answered:
"We have had our farewell, David. We shall meet no more till we meet
in the city of God." He spoke with a subdued enthusiasm, and his
grave face was luminous with an interior transfiguration. Suddenly
the sun came from behind a cloud, and the flying shower was crowned
with a glorious rainbow. He drew David to the window, and said in
a rapture of adoration:
"The token of His covenant! It compasseth the heavens about with a
glorious circle, and _the hands of the Most High have bended it_.
Could any words be more vitally realistic, David? Tell your father
what you have seen--the token of His covenant! The token of His
covenant!"
And David went away, awed and silent; for there was in the minister's
eyes that singular brilliance which presages a vision of things
invisible. They looked straight into the sunshine. Did they see
beyond it to where the "innumerable company of angels" were
singing, "Holy, holy, holy"?
Indeed, he was so much impressed that he took the longest way
home. He wanted to think over what his father and the minister had
said, and he wanted that solitude of nature which had so often
been to him the voice of God. The road itself was only a foot-path
across a melancholy moor, covered with heather and boulders, and
encompassed by cyclopean wrecks of mountains, the vapory outlines of
which suggested nothing but endless ruin. Although the season was
midsummer, there had been sharp, surly whiffs of rain all day long,
and the dreary levels were full of little lochs of black moss
water. So David kept to the seaward side, where the land was higher,
and where he could see the roll of a spent gale swinging round
Vatternish toward the red, rent bastions of Skye, and hear its
thunder amid the purple caves of the basalt and the whitened tiers of
the ooelite, silencing all meaner sounds.
After a trailing, thoughtful walk of a mile, he came to a spot where
a circle of druidical monoliths stood huge and pale in the misty
air. He went straight into the haunted place with the manner of
one familiar with it, cast his nets on the low central stone which
had once been the sacrificial altar of the dead creed, and then
leaned wearily against one of the sheltering pillars.
His person was at this time remarkably handsome and in wonderful
harmony with its surroundings. He was large and strong--a man not
made for the narrow doorways of the town, but for the wide, stormy
spaces of the unstreeted ocean. The sea was in his eyes, which were
blue and outlooking; his broad breast was bared to the wind and
rain; his legs were planted apart, as if he was hauling up an anchor
or standing on a reeling deck. An air of somber gravity, a face
sad and mystical, distinguished his solitary figure. He was the
unconscious incarnation of the lonely land and the stormy sea.
Leaning against the pagan pillar, he revolved in his mind those
great questions that survive every change of race and dynasty: Whence
come we? Where go we? How can a man be justified with God? Though
the rain smote him east and west, he was in the sunshine of the Holy
Land; he was drawing nets with Simon Peter on the Sea of Galilee; he
was listening to Him who spake as never man spake. Suddenly the
sharp whistle of a passing steamer roused him. He turned his eyes
seaward, and saw the _Polly Ann_ hastening to the railway port with
her load of fish for the Glasgow market. The sight set him again in
the nineteenth century. Then he felt the rain, and he drew his bonnet
over his brows, and lifted his nets, and began to walk toward the
little black hut on the horizon. It was of large stones roughly
mortared together, and it had a low chimney, and a door fastened with
a leather strap; but the small window wanted the screen of white
muslin usual in Highland cots, and was dim with dust and cobwebs.
It was David's home, and he knew his father waited there for his
coming; so he hastened his steps; but the radiant, dreamy look
which had made him handsome was gone, and he approached the door
with the air of a man who is weary of to-day and without hope for the
morrow. At the threshold he threw off this aspect, and entered
with a smile. His father, sitting wearily in a wooden arm-chair,
turned his face to meet him. It was the face of a man walking with
death. Human agony grimly borne without complaint furrowed it;
gray as ashes were the cheeks, and the eyes alone retained the
"spark of heavenly flame" which we call life.