"Oh, yes; oh, certainly!" she said, hurriedly; but she did not know how

to retrieve her obvious mistake.

*CHAPTER XI.*

*AN UNSPOKEN APPEAL.*

"What have I done? Is she vexed? Have I offended her?" he asked the

next morning, in a rapid manner, when his hostess came on deck. The

gale had abated somewhat, but gloom overspread earth and sky. It was

nothing to the gloom that overspread his usually frank and cheerful

face.

"You mean Mary?" she says, though she knows well enough.

"Yes; haven't you seen? She seems to treat me as though we had never

met before--as though we were perfect strangers--and I know she is too

kind-hearted to cause any one pain----"

Here he looks somewhat embarrassed for a moment; but his customary

straightforwardness comes to his rescue.

"Yes; I will confess I am very much hurt by it. And--and I should like

to know if there is any cause. Surely you must have noticed it?"

She had noticed it, sure enough; and, in contrast with that studied

coldness which Mary Avon had shown to her friend of former days, she had

remarked the exceeding friendliness the young lady was extending to the

Laird's nephew. But would she draw the obvious conclusion? Not likely;

she was too staunch a friend to believe any such thing. All the same

there remained in her mind a vague feeling of surprise, with perhaps a

touch of personal injury.

"Well, Angus, you know," she said, evasively; "Mary is very much

preoccupied just at present. Her whole condition of life is changed,

and she has many things to think of----"

"Yes; but she is frank enough with her other friends. What have I done,

that I should be made a stranger of?"

A pathetic answer comes to these idle frettings of the hour. Far away

on the shore a number of small black figures emerge from the woods, and

slowly pass along the winding road that skirts the rocks. They are

following a cart--a common farmyard cart; but on the wooden planks is

placed a dark object that is touched here and there with silver--or

perhaps it is only the white cords. Between the overhanging gloom of

the mountains and the cold greys of the wind-swept sea the small black

line passes slowly on. And these two on board the yacht watch it in

silence. Are they listening for the wail of the pipes--the wild dirge

of Lord Lovat, or the cry of the _Cumhadh na Cloinne_? But the winds

are loud, and the rushing seas are loud; and now the rude farmyard cart,

with its solemn burden, is away out at the point; and presently the

whole simple pageant has disappeared. The lonely burying-ground lies far

away among the hills.

Angus Sutherland turns round again, with a brief sigh.

"It will be all the same in a few years," he says to his hostess; and

then he adds, indifferently, "What do you say about starting? The wind

is against us; but anything is better than lying here. There were some

bad squalls in the night."

Very soon after this the silent loch is resounding with the rattle of

halyards, blocks, and chains; and Angus Sutherland is seeking

distraction from those secret cares of the moment in the excitement of

hard work. Nor is it any joke getting in that enormous quantity of

anchor chain. In the midst of all the noise and bustle Mary Avon

appears on deck to see what is going on, and she is immediately followed

by young Smith.

"Why don't you help them?" she says, laughing.

"So I would, if I knew what to do," he says, good-naturedly. "I'll go

and ask Dr. Sutherland."

It was a fatal step. Angus Sutherland suggested, somewhat grimly, that,

if he liked, he might lend them a hand at the windlass. A muscular young

Englishman does not like to give in; and for a time he held his own with

the best of them; but long before the starboard anchor had been got up,

and the port one hove short, he had had enough of it. He did not

volunteer to assist at the throat halyards. To Miss Avon, who was

calmly looking on, he observed that it would take him about a fortnight

to get his back straight.

"That," said she, finding an excuse for him instantly, "is because you

worked too hard at it at first. You should have watched the Islay man.

All he does is to call 'Heave!' and to make his shoulders go up as if he

were going to do the whole thing himself. But he does not help a bit.

I have watched him again and again."

"Your friend, Dr. Sutherland," said he, regarding her for an instant as

he spoke, "seems to work as hard as any of them."

"He is very fond of it," she said, simply, without any embarrassment;

nor did she appear to regard it as singular that Angus Sutherland should

have been spoken of specially as her friend.

Angus Sutherland himself comes rapidly aft, loosens the tiller rope, and

jams the helm over. And now the anchor is hove right up; the reefed

mainsail and small jib quickly fill out before this fresh breeze; and,

presently, with a sudden cessation of noise, we are spinning away

through the leaden-coloured waters. We are not sorry to get away from

under the gloom of these giant hills; for the day still looks squally,

and occasionally a scud of rain comes whipping across, scarcely

sufficient to wet the decks. And there is more life and animation on

board now; a good deal of walking up and down in ulsters, with

inevitable collisions; and of remarks shouted against, or with, the

wind; and of joyful pointing towards certain silver gleams of light in

the west and south. There is hope in front; behind us nothing but

darkness and the threatenings of storm. The Pap of Glencoe has

disappeared in rain; the huge mountains on the right are as black as the

deeds of murder done in the glen below; Ardgour over there, and Lochaber

here, are steeped in gloom. And there is less sadness now in the old

refrain of Lochaber since there is a prospect of the South shining

before us. If Mary Avon is singing to herself about

_Lochaber no more! And Lochaber no more!_

_We'll maybe return to Lochaber no more!_

--it is with a light heart.

But then if it is a fine thing to go bowling along with a brisk breeze

on our beam, it is very different when we get round Ardshiel and find

the southerly wind veering to meet us dead in the teeth. And there is a

good sea running up Loch Linnhe--a heavy grey-green sea that the _White

Dove_ meets and breaks, with spurts of spray forward, and a line of

hissing foam in our wake. The zig-zag beating takes us alternately to

Ardgour and Appin, until we can see here and there the cheerful patches

of yellow corn at the foot of the giant and gloomy hills; then "'Bout

ship" again, and away we go on the heaving and rushing grey-green sea.

And is Mary Avon's oldest friend--the woman who is the staunchest of

champions--being at last driven to look askance at the girl? Is it fair

that the young lady should be so studiously silent when our faithful

Doctor is by, and instantly begin to talk again when he goes forward to

help at the jib or foresail sheets? And when he asks her, as in former

days, to take the tiller, she somewhat coldly declines the offer he has

so timidly and respectfully made. But as for Mr. Smith, that is a very

different matter. It is he whom she allows to go below for some wrapper

for her neck. It is he who stands by, ready to shove over the top of

the companion when she crouches to avoid a passing shower of rain. It

is he with whom she jokes and talks--when the Laird does not monopolise

her.

"I would have believed it of any girl in the world rather than of her,"

says her hostess, to another person, when these two happen to be alone

in the saloon below. "I don't believe it yet. It is impossible. Of

course a girl who is left as penniless as she is might be pardoned for

looking round and being friendly with rich people who are well inclined

towards her; but I don't believe--I say it is impossible--that she

should have thrown Angus over just because she saw a chance of marrying

the Laird's nephew. Why, there never was a girl we have ever known so

independent as she is!--not any one half as proud and as fearless. She

looks upon going to London and earning her own living as nothing at all!

She is the very last girl in the world to speculate on making a good

match--she has too much pride--she would not speak another word to

Howard Smith if such a monstrous thing were suggested to her."

"Very well," says the meek listener. The possibility was not of his

suggesting, assuredly: he knows better.

Then the Admiral-in-chief of the _White Dove_ sits silent and puzzled

for a time.

"And yet her treatment of poor Angus is most unfair. He is deeply hurt

by it--he told me so this morning----"

"If he is so fearfully sensitive that he cannot go yachting and enjoy

his holiday because a girl does not pay him attention----"

"Why, what do you suppose he came back here for?" she says, warmly. "To

go sailing in the _White Dove_? No; not if twenty _White Doves_ were

waiting for him! He knows too well the value of his time to stay away

so long from London if it were merely to take the tiller of a yacht. He

came back here, at great personal sacrifice, because Mary was on board."

"Has he told you so?"

"He has not; but one has eyes."

"Then suppose she has changed her mind: how can you help it?"

She says nothing for a second. She is preparing the table for Master

Fred: perhaps she tosses the novels on to the couch with an impatience

they do not at all deserve. But at length she says--

"Well; I never thought Mary would have been so fickle as to go chopping

and changing about within the course of a few weeks. However, I won't

accuse her of being mercenary; I will not believe that. Howard Smith is

a most gentlemanly young man--good-looking, too, and pleasant tempered.

I can imagine any girl liking him."

Here a volume of poems is pitched on to the top of the draught-board, as

if it had done her some personal injury.

"And in any case she might be more civil to one who is a very old friend

of ours," she adds.

Further discourse on this matter is impossible; for our Freidrich d'or

comes in to prepare for luncheon. But why the charge of incivility?

When we are once more assembled together, the girl is quite the reverse

of uncivil towards him. She shows him--when she is forced to speak to

him--an almost painful courtesy; and she turns her eyes down, as if she

were afraid to speak to him. This is no flaunting coquette, proud of

her wilful caprice.

And as for poor Angus, he does his best to propitiate her. They begin

talking about the picturesqueness of various cities. Knowing that Miss

Avon has lived the most of her life, if she was not actually born, in

London, he strikes boldly for London. What is there in Venice, what is

there in the world, like London in moonlight--with the splendid sweep of

her river--and the long lines of gas-lamps--and the noble bridges? But

she is all for Edinburgh if Edinburgh had but the Moldau running through

that valley, and the bridges of Prague to span it, what city in Europe

could compare with it? And the Laird is so delighted with her approval

of the Scotch capital, that he forgets for the moment his Glaswegian

antipathy to the rival city, and enlarges no less on the picturesqueness

of it than on its wealth of historical traditions. There is not a stain

of blood on any floor that he does not believe in. Then the Sanctuary

of Holyrood: what stories has he not to tell about that famous refuse?

"I believe the mysterious influence of that Sanctuary has gone out and

charmed all the country about Edinburgh," said our young Doctor. "I

suppose you know that there are several plants, poisonous elsewhere,

that are quite harmless in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh. You remember

I told you, Miss Avon, that evening we went out to Arthur's Seat?"

It was well done, Queen Titania must have thought, to expose this

graceless flirt before her new friends. So she had been walking out to

Arthur's Seat with him, in the summer afternoons?

"Y--yes," says the girl.

"Ay; that is a most curious thing," says the Laird, not noticing her

downcast looks and flushed cheeks. "But what were they, did ye say?"

"Umbelliferous plants," replies Angus Sutherland, in quite a

matter-of-fact manner. "The _OEnanthe crocata_ is one of them, I

remember; and I think the _Cicuta virosa_--that is, the Water Hemlock."

"I would jist like to know," says the Laird, somewhat pompously,

"whether that does not hold good about the neighbourhood of Glesca also.

There's nothing so particular healthy about the climate of Edinburgh, as

far as ever I heard tell of. Quite the reverse--quite the reverse.

East winds--fogs--no wonder the people are shilpit-looking creatures as

a general rule--like a lot o' Paisley weavers. But the ceety is a fine

ceety, I will admit that; and many's the time I've said to Tom Galbraith

that he could get no finer thing to paint than the view of the High

Street at night from Prince's Street--especially on a moonlight night.

A fine ceety: but the people themselves!--" here the Laird shook his

head. "And their manner o' speech is most vexsome--a long, sing-song

kind o' yaumering as if they had not sufficient manliness to say

outright what they meant. If we are to have a Scotch accent, I prefer

the accent--the very slight accent--ye hear about Glesca. I would like

to hear what Miss Avon has to say upon that point."

"I am not a very good judge, sir," says Miss Avon, prudently.

Then on deck. The leaden-black waves are breaking in white foam along

the shores of Kingairloch and the opposite rocks of Eilean-na-Shuna; and

we are still laboriously beating against the southerly wind; but those

silver-yellow gleams in the south have increased, over the softly-purple

hills of Morvern and Duart. Black as night are the vast ranges of

mountains in the north; but they are far behind us; we have now no

longer any fear of a white shaft of lightning falling from the gloom

overhead.

The decks are dry now; camp-stools are in requisition; there is to be a

consultation about our future plans, after the _White Dove_ has been

beached for a couple of days. The Laird admits that, if it had been

three days or four days, he would like to run through to Glasgow and to

Strathgovan, just to see how they are getting on with the gas-lamps in

the Mitherdrum Road; but, as it is, he will write for a detailed report;

hence he is free to go wherever we wish. Miss Avon, interrogated,

answers that she thinks she must leave us and set out for London;

whereupon she is bidden to hold her tongue and not talk foolishness.

Our Doctor, also interrogated, looks down on the sitting parliament--he

is standing at the tiller--and laughs.

"Don't be too sure of getting to Castle Osprey to-night," he says,

"whatever your plans may be. The breeze is falling off a bit. But you

may put me down as willing to go anywhere with you, if you will let me

come."

This decision seemed greatly to delight his hostess. She said we could

not do without him. She was herself ready to go anywhere now; she

eagerly embraced the Youth's suggestion that there were, according to

John of Skye's account, vast numbers of seals in the bays on the western

shores of Knapdale; and at once assured the Laird, who said he

particularly wanted a sealskin or two and some skarts' feathers for a

young lady, that he should not be disappointed. Knapdale, then, it was

to be.

But in the meantime? Dinner found us in a dead calm. After dinner,

when we came on deck, the sun had gone down; and in the pale, tender

blue-grey of the twilight, the golden star of Lismore lighthouse was

already shining. Then we had our warning lights put up--the port red

light shedding a soft crimson glow on the bow of the dingay, the

starboard green light touching with a cold, wan colour the iron shrouds.

To crown all, as we were watching the dark shadows of Lismore island, a

thin, white, vivid line--like the edge of a shilling--appeared over the

low hill; and then the full moon rose into the partially clouded sky.

It was a beautiful night.

But we gave up all hope of reaching Castle Osprey. The breeze had quite

gone; the calm sea slowly rolled. We went below--to books, draughts,

and what not; Angus Sutherland alone remaining on deck, having his pipe

for his companion.

It was about an hour afterwards that we were startled by sounds on deck;

and presently we knew that the _White Dove_ was again flying through the

water. The women took some little time to get their shawls and things

ready; had they known what was awaiting them, they would have been more

alert.

For no sooner were we on deck than we perceived that the _White Dove_

was tearing through the water without the slightest landmark or light to

guide her. The breeze that had sprung up had swept before it a bank of

sea-fog--a most unusual thing in these windy and changeable latitudes;

and so dense was this fog that the land on all sides of us had

disappeared, while it was quite impossible to say where Lismore

light-house was. Angus Sutherland had promptly surrendered the helm to

John of Skye; and had gone forward. The men on the look out at the bow

were themselves invisible.

"Oh, it is all right, mem!" called out John of Skye, through the dense

fog, in answer to a question. "I know the lay o' the land very well,

though I do not see it. And I will keep her down to Duart, bekass of

the tide."

And then he calls out--

"Hector, do you not see any land yet?'

"_Cha n'eil!_" answers Hector, in his native tongue.

"We'll put a tack on her now. Ready about, boys!"

"_Ready about!_"

Round slews her head, with blocks and sails clattering and flapping;

there is a scuffle of making fast the lee sheets; then once more the

_White Dove_ goes plunging into the unknown. The non-experts see

nothing at all but the fog; they have not the least idea whether Lismore

lighthouse--which is a solid object to run against--is on port or

starboard bow, or right astern, for the matter of that. They are huddled

in a group about the top of the companion. They can only listen, and

wait.

John of Skye's voice rings out again.

"Hector, can you not mek out the land yet?"

"_Cha n'eil!_"

"What does he say?" the Laird asks, almost in a whisper: he is afraid to

distract attention at such a time.

"He says 'No,'" Angus Sutherland answers. "He cannot make out the land.

It is very thick; and there are bad rocks between Lismore and Duart. I

think I will climb up to the cross-trees and have a look round."

What was this? A girl's hand laid for an instant on his arm; a girl's

voice--low, quick, beseeching--saying "Oh, no!"

It was the trifle of a moment.

"There is not the least danger," says he, lightly. "Sometimes you can

see better at the cross-trees."

Then the dim figure is seen going up the shrouds; but he is not quite up

at the cross-trees, when the voice of John of Skye is heard again.

"Mr. Sutherland!

"All right, John!" and the dusky figure comes stumbling down and across

the loose sheets on deck.

"If ye please, sir," says John of Skye; and the well-known formula means

that Angus Sutherland is to take the helm. Captain John goes forward to

the bow: the only sound around us is the surging of the unseen waves.

"I hope you are not frightened, Miss Avon," says Mr. Smith, quite

cheerfully; though he is probably listening, like the rest of us, for

the sullen roaring of breakers in the dark.

"No--I am bewildered--I don't know what it is all about."

"You need not be afraid," Angus Sutherland says to her, abruptly, for he

will not have the Youth interfere in such matters, "with Captain John on

board. He sees better in a fog than most men in daylight."

"We are in the safe keeping of one greater than any Captain John," says

the Laird, simply and gravely: he is not in any alarm.

Then a call from the bow.

"Helm hard down, sir!"

"Hard down it is, John!"

Then the rattle again of sheets and sails; and as she swings round again

on the other tack, what is that vague, impalpable shadow one sees--or

fancies one sees--on the starboard bow?

"Is that the land, John?" Angus Sutherland asks, as the skipper comes

aft.

"Oh, ay!" says he, with a chuckle. "I was thinking to myself it wass

the loom of Duart I sah once or twice. And I wass saying to Hector if

it wass his sweetheart he will look, for he will see better in the

night."

Then by and by this other object, to which all attention is summoned:

the fog grows thinner and thinner; some one catches sight of a pale,

glimmering light on our port quarter; and we know that we have left

Lismore lighthouse in our wake. And still the fog grows thinner, until

it is suffused with a pale blue radiance; then suddenly we sail out into

the beautiful moonlight, with the hills along the horizon all black

under the clear and solemn skies.

It is a pleasant sail into the smooth harbour on this enchanted night:

the far windows of Castle Osprey are all aglow; the mariners are to rest

for a while from the travail of the sea. And as we go up the moonlit

road, the Laird is jocular enough; and asks Mary Avon, who is his

companion, whether she was prepared to sing "Lochaber no more!" when we

were going blindly through the mist. But our young Doctor remembers

that hour or so of mist for another reason. There was something in the

sound of the girl's voice he cannot forget. The touch of her hand was

slight; but his arm has not even yet parted with the thrill of it.

*CHAPTER XII.*

*HIS LORDSHIP.*

Miss Avon is seated in the garden in front of Castle Osprey, under the

shade of a drooping ash. Her book lies neglected beside her, on the

iron seat; she is idly looking abroad on the sea and the mountains, now

all aglow in the warm light of the afternoon.

There is a clanging of a gate below. Presently, up the steep gravel

path, comes a tall and handsome young fellow, in full shooting

accoutrement, with his gun over his shoulder. Her face instantly loses

its dreamy expression. She welcomes him with a cheerful "Good evening!"

and asks what sport he has had. For answer he comes across the

greensward; places his gun against the trunk of the ash; takes a seat

beside her; and puts his hands round one knee.

"It is a long story," says the Youth. "Will it bore you to hear it?

I've seen how the women in a country house dread the beginning of the

talk at dinner about the day's shooting; and yet give themselves up,

like the martyrs and angels they are; and--and it is very different from

hunting, don't you know, for there the women can talk as much as

anybody."

"Oh! but I should like to hear, really," says she. "It was so kind of

a stranger on board a steamer to offer you a day's shooting."

"Well, it was," says he; "and the place has been shot over only once--on

the 12th. Very well; you shall hear the whole story. I met the keeper

by appointment, down at the quay. I don't know what sort of a fellow he

is--Highlander or Lowlander--I am not such a swell at those things as my

uncle is; but I should have said he talked a most promising mixture of

Devonshire, Yorkshire, and Westmoreland----"

"What was his name?"

"I don't know," says the other leisurely. "I called him Donald, on

chance; and he took to it well enough. I confess I thought it rather

odd he had only one dog with him--an old retriever; but then, don't you

know, the moor had been shot over only once; and I thought we might get

along. As we walked along to the hill, Donald says, 'Dinna tha mind,

sir, if a blackcock gets up; knock un ower, knock un ower, sir.'"

At this point Miss Avon most unfairly bursts out laughing.

"Why," she says, "what sort of countryman was he if he talked like that?

That is how they speak in plays about the colliery districts."

"Oh, it's all the same!" says the young man, quite unabashed. "I gave

him my bag to carry, and put eight or ten cartridges in my pockets. 'A

few mower, sir; a few mower, sir,' says Donald; and crams my pockets

full. Then he would have me put cartridges in my gun even before we left

the road; and as soon as we began to ascend the hill I saw he was on the

outlook for a straggler or two, or perhaps a hare. But he warned me

that the shooting had been very bad in these districts this year; and

that on the 12th the rain was so persistent that scarcely anybody went

out. Where could we have been on the 12th? surely there was no such rain

with us?"

"But when you are away from the hills you miss the rain," remarks this

profound meteorologist.

"Ah! perhaps so. However, Donald said, 'His lordship went hout for an

hour, and got a brace and a alf. His lordship is no keen for a big bag,

ye ken; but is just satisfied if he can get a brace or a couple of brace

afore luncheon. It is the exerceez he likes.' I then discovered that

Lord ---- had had this moor as part of his shooting last year; and I

assured Donald I did not hunger after slaughter. So we climbed higher

and higher. I found Donald a most instructive companion. He was very

great on the ownership of the land about here; and the old families,

don't you know; and all that kind of thine. I heard a lot about the

MacDougalls, and how they had all their possessions confiscated in 1745;

and how, when the Government pardoned them, and ordered the land to be

restored, the Campbells and Breadalbane, into whose hands it had fallen,

kept all the best bits for themselves. I asked Donald why they did not

complain; he only grinned; I suppose they were afraid to make a row.

Then there was one MacDougall, an admiral or captain, don't you know;

and he sent a boat to rescue some shipwrecked men, and the boat was

swamped. Then he would send another; and that was swamped, too. The

Government, Donald informed me, wanted to hang him for his philanthropy;

but he had influential friends; and he was let off on the payment of a

large sum of money--I suppose out of what Argyll and Breadalbane had

left him."

The Youth calmly shifted his hands to the other knee.

"You see, Miss Avon, this was all very interesting; but I had to ask

Donald where the birds were. 'I'll let loose the doag now,' says he.

Well; he did so. You would have thought he had let loose a sky-rocket!

It was off and away--up hill and down dale--and all his whistling wasn't

of the slightest use. 'He's a bit wild,' Donald had to admit; 'but if I

had kent you were agoin' shootin' earlier in the morning, I would have

given him a run or two to take the freshness hoff. But on a day like

this, sir, there's no scent; we will just have to walk them up; they'll

lie as close as a water-hen.' So we left the dog to look after himself;

and on we pounded. Do you see that long ridge of rugged hill?"

He pointed to the coast-line beyond the bay.

"Yes."

"We had to climb that, to start with; and not even a glimpse of a rabbit

all the way up. ''Ave a care, sir,' says Donald; and I took down my gun

from my shoulder, expecting to walk into a whole covey at least. 'His

lordship shot a brace and a alf of grouse on this wery knoll the last

day he shot over the moor last year.' And now there was less talking,

don't you know; and we went cautiously through the heather, working

every bit of it, until we got right to the end of the knoll. 'It's fine

heather,' says Donald; 'bees would dae well here.' On we went; and

Donald's information began again. He pointed out a house on some

distant island where Alexander III. was buried. 'But where are the

birds?' I asked of him, at last. 'Oh,' says he, 'his lordship was never

greedy after the shootin'! A brace or two afore luncheon was all he

wanted. He baint none o' your greedy ones, he baint. His lordship shot

a hare on this very side last year--a fine long shot.' We went on

again: you know what sort of morning it was, Miss Avon?"

"It was hot enough even in the shelter of the trees."

"Up there it was dreadful: not a breath of wind: the sun blistering.

And still we ploughed through that knee-deep heather, with the retriever

sometimes coming within a mile of us; and Donald back to his old

families. It was the MacDonnells now; he said they had no right to that

name; their proper name was MacAlister--Mack Mick Alister, I think he

said. 'But where the dickens are the birds?' I asked. 'If we get a

brace afore luncheon, we'll do fine,' said he; and then he added,

'There's a braw cold well down there that his lordship aye stopped at.'

The hint was enough; we had our dram. Then we went on, and on, and on,

and on, until I struck work, and sat down, and waited for the luncheon

basket."

"We were so afraid Fred would be late," she said; "the men were all so

busy down at the yacht."

"What did it matter?" the Youth said, resignedly. "I was being

instructed. He had got further back still now, to the Druids, don't you

know, and the antiquity of the Gaelic language. 'What was the river

that ran by Rome?' 'The Tiber,' I said. 'And what,' he asked, 'was

_Tober_ in Gaelic but a spring or fountain?' And the Tamar in

Devonshire was the same thing. And the various Usks--_uska_, it seems,

is the Gaelic for water. Well, I'm hanged if I know what that man did

_not_ talk about!"

"But surely such a keeper must be invaluable," remarked the young lady,

innocently.

"Perhaps. I confess I got a little bit tired of it; but no doubt the

poor fellow was doing his best to make up for the want of birds.

However, we started again after luncheon. And now we came to place

after place where his lordship had performed the most wonderful feats

last year. And, mind you, the dog wasn't ranging so wild now; if there

had been the ghost of a shadow of a feather in the whole district we

must have seen it. Then we came to another well where his lordship used

to stop for a drink. Then we arrived at a crest where no one who had

ever shot on the moor had ever failed to get a brace or two. A brace or

two! What we flushed was a covey of sheep that flew like mad things

down the hill. Well, Donald gave in at last. He could not find words

to express his astonishment. His lordship had never come along that

highest ridge without getting at least two or three shots. And when I

set out for home, he still stuck to it; he would not let me take the

cartridges out of my gun; he assured me his lordship never failed to get

a snipe or a blackcock on the way home. Confound his lordship!"

"And is that all the story?" says the young lady, with her eyes wide

open.

"Yes, it is," says he, with a tragic gloom on the handsome face.

"You have not brought home a single bird?"

"Not a feather!--never saw one."

"Nor even a rabbit?'

"Nary rabbit!"

"Why, Fred was up here a short time ago, wanting a few birds for the

yacht."

"Oh, indeed," says he, with a sombre contempt. "Perhaps he will go and

ask his lordship for them. In the meantime, I'm going in to dress for

dinner. I suppose his lordship would do that, too, after having shot

his thirty brace."

"You must not, any way," she says. "There is to be no dressing for

dinner to-day; we are all going down to the yacht after."

"At all events," he says, "I must get my shooting things off. Much good

I've done with 'em!"

So he goes into the house, and leaves her alone. But this chat together

seems to have brightened her up somewhat; and with a careless and

cheerful air she goes over to the flower borders and begins culling an

assortment of various-hued blossoms. The evening is becoming cooler;

she is not so much afraid of the sun's glare; it is a pleasant task; and

she is singing, or humming, snatches of songs of the most heterogeneous

character.

_Then fill up a bumper!--what can I do less_

_Than drink to the health of my bonny Black Bess!_

--this is the point at which she has arrived when she suddenly becomes

silent, and for a second her face is suffused with a conscious colour.

It is our young Doctor who has appeared on the gravel path. She does

not rise from her stooping position; but she hurries with her work.

"You are going to decorate the dinner-table, I suppose?" he says,

somewhat timidly.

"Yes," she answers, without raising her head. The fingers work nimbly

enough: why so much hurry?

"You will take some down to the yacht, too?" he says. "Everything is

quite ready now for the start to-morrow."

"Oh, yes!" she says. "And I think I have enough now for the table. I

must go in."

"Miss Avon," he says; and she stops--with her eyes downcast. "I wanted

to say a word to you. You have once or twice spoken about going away.

I wanted to ask you--you won't think it is any rudeness. But if the

reason was--if it was the presence of any one that was distasteful to

you----"

"Oh, I hope no one will think that!" she answers, quickly; and for one

second the soft, black, pathetic eyes meet his. "I am very happy to be

amongst such good friends--too happy, I think--I, I must think of other

things----"

And here she seems to force this embarrassment away from her; and she

says to him, with quite a pleasant air--

"I am so glad to hear that the _White Dove_ will sail so much better

now. It must be so much more pleasant for you, when you understand all

about it."

And then she goes into the house to put the flowers on the table. He,

left alone, goes over to the iron seat beneath the ash tree; and takes

up the book she has been reading, and bends his eyes on the page. It is

not the book he is thinking about.

*CHAPTER XIII.*

*THE LAIRD'S PLANS.*

Who is first up to thrust aside those delusive yellow blinds that

suggest sunshine whether the morning be fair or foul? But the first

glance through the panes removes all apprehensions: the ruffled bay, the

fluttering ensign, the shining white wings of the _White Dove_ are all a

summons to the slumbering house. And the mistress of Castle Osprey, as

soon as she is dressed, is up stairs and down stairs like a furred flash

of lightning. Her cry and potent command--a reminiscence of certain

transatlantic experiences--is, "_All aboard for Dan'ls!_" She will not

have so fine a sailing morning wasted, especially when Dr. Angus

Sutherland is with us.

Strangely enough, when at last we stand on the white decks, and look

round on the shining brass and varnished wood, and help to stow away the

various articles needed for our cruise, he is the least excited of all

those chattering people. There is a certain conscious elation on

starting on a voyage, especially on a beautiful morning; but there also

may be some vague and dim apprehension. The beginning is here; but the

end? Angus walked about with Captain John, and was shown all that had

been done to the yacht, and listened in silence.

But the rest were noisy enough, calling for this and that, handing

things down the companion, and generally getting in the way of the

steward.

"Well, Fred," says our facetious Laird, "have ye hung up all the game

that Mr. Smith brought back from the moor yesterday?" and Master Fred

was so much tickled by this profound joke that he had to go down into

the forecastle to hide his grinning delight, and went covertly smiling

about his work for the next quarter of an hour.

Then the hubbub gradually ceased; for the boats had been swung to the

davits, and the _White Dove_ was gently slipping away from her moorings.

A fine northerly breeze; a ruffled blue sea; and the south all shining

before her! How should we care whither the beautiful bird bore us?

Perhaps before the night fell we should be listening for the singing of

the mermaid of Colonsay.

The wooded shores slowly drew away; the horizon widened; there was no

still blue, but a fine windy grey, on the vast plain of the sea that was

opening out before us.

"Oh, yes, mem!" says John of Skye to Miss Avon. "I wass sure we would

get a good breeze for Mr. Sutherland when he will come back to the yat."

Miss Avon does not answer: she is looking at the wide sea, and at the

far islands, with somewhat wistful eyes.

"Would you like to tek the tiller, now, mem?" says the bearded skipper,

in his most courteous tones. "Mr. Sutherland was aye very proud to see

ye at the tiller."

"No, thank you, John," she says.

And then she becomes aware that she has--in her absent mood---spoken

somewhat curtly; so she turns and comes over to him, and says in a

confidential way--

"To tell you the truth, John, I never feel very safe in steering when

the yacht is going before the wind. When she is close-hauled I have

something to guide me; but with the wind coming behind I know I may make

a blunder without knowing why."

"No, no, mem; you must not let Mr. Sutherland hear you say that: when he

was so prood o' learnin' ye; and there is no dancher at ahl of your

making a plunder."

But at this moment our young Doctor himself comes on deck; and she

quickly moves away to her camp-stool, and plunges herself into a book;

while the attentive Mr. Smith provides her with a sunshade and a

footstool. Dr. Sutherland cannot, of course, interfere with her diligent

studies.

Meanwhile our hostess is below, putting a few finishing touches to the

decoration of the saloon; while the Laird, in the blue-cushioned recess

at the head of the table, is poring over _Municipal London_. At length

he raises his eyes, and says to his sole companion--

"I told ye, ma'am, he was a good lad--a biddable lad--did I not?"

"You are speaking of your nephew, of course," she says. "Well; it is

very kind of him to offer to turn out of his state-room in favour of Dr.

Sutherland; but there is really no need for it. Angus is much better

accustomed to roughing it on board a yacht."

"I beg your pardon, ma'am," says the Laird, with judicial gravity.

"Howard is in the right there too. He must insist on it. Dr.

Sutherland is your oldest friend. Howard is here on a kind of

sufferance. I am sure we are both of us greatly obliged to ye."

Here there was the usual deprecation.

"And I will say," observes the Laird, with the same profound air, "that

his conduct since I sent for him has entirely my approval--entirely my

approval. Ye know what I mean. I would not say a word to him for the

world--no, no--after the first intimation of my wishes, no coercion.

Every one for himself: no coercion."

She does not seem so overjoyed as might have been expected.

"Oh, of course not!" she says. "It is only in plays and books that

anybody is forced into a marriage; at least you don't often find a man

driven to marry anybody against his will. And indeed, sir," she adds,

with a faint smile, "you rather frightened your nephew at first. He

thought you were going to play the part of a stage guardian, and

disinherit him if he did not marry the young lady. But I took the

liberty of saying to him that you could not possibly be so unreasonable.

Because, you know, if Mary refused to marry him, how could that be any

fault of his?"

"Precisely so," said the Laird, in his grand manner. "A most judeecious

and sensible remark. Let him do his part, and I am satisfied. I would

not exact impossibeelities from any one, much less from one that I have

a particular regard for. And, as I was saying, Howard is a good lad."

The Laird adopted a lighter tone.

"Have ye observed, ma'am, that things are not at all unlikely to turn

out as we wished?" he said, in a half-whisper; and there was a secret

triumph in his look. "Have ye observed? Oh, yes! young folks are very

shy; but their elders are not blind. Did ye ever see two young people

that seemed to get on better together on so short an acquaintance?"

"Oh, yes!" she says, rather gloomily; "they seem to be very good

friends."

"Yachting is a famous thing for making people acquainted," says the

Laird, with increasing delight. "They know one another now as well as

though they had been friends for years on the land. Has that struck ye

now before?"

"Oh, yes!" she says. There is no delight on _her_ face.

"It will jist be the happiness of my old age, if the Lord spares me, to

see these two established at Denny-mains," says he, as if he were

looking at the picture before his very eyes. "And we have a fine soft

air in the west of Scotland; it's no like asking a young English leddy

to live in the bleaker parts of the north, or among the east winds of

Edinburgh. And I would not have the children sent to any public school,

to learn vulgar ways of speech and clipping of words. No, no; I would

wale out a young man from our Glasgow University--one familiar with the

proper tradeetions of the English language; and he will guard against

the clipping fashion of the South, just as against the yaumering of the

Edinburgh bodies. Ah will wale him out maself. But no too much

education: no, no; that is the worst gift ye can bestow upon bairns. A

sound constitution; that is first and foremost. I would rather see a

lad out and about shooting rabbits than shut up wi' a pale face among a

lot of books. And the boys will have their play, I can assure ye; I

will send that fellow Andrew about his business if he doesna stop

netting and snaring. What do I care about the snipping at the shrubs? I

will put out turnips on the verra lawn, jist to see the rabbits run

about in the morning. The boys shall have their play at Denny-mains, I

can assure ye; more play than school-hours, or I'm mistaken!"

The Laird laughed to himself just as if he had been telling a good one

about Homesh.

"And no muzzle-loaders," he continued, with a sudden seriousness. "Not

a muzzle-loader will I have put into their hands. Many's the time it

makes me grue to think of my loading a muzzle-loader when I was a

boy--loading one barrel, with the other barrel on full-cock, and jist

gaping to blow my fingers off. I'm thinking Miss Mary--though she'll no

be Miss Mary then--will be sore put to when the boys bring in thrushes

and blackbirds they have shot; for she's a sensitive bit thing; but what

I say is, better let them shoot thrushes and blackbirds than bring them

up to have white faces ower books. Ah tell ye this: I'll give them a

sovereign a-piece for every blackbird they shoot on the wing!"

The Laird had got quite excited; he did not notice that _Municipal

London_ was dangerously near the edge of the table.

"Andrew will not objeck to the shooting o' blackbirds," he said, with a

loud laugh--as if there was something of Homesh's vein in that gardener.

"The poor crayture is just daft about his cherries. That's another

thing; no interference with bairns in a garden. Let them steal what

they like. Green apples? bless ye, they're the life o' children!

Nature puts everything to rights. She kens better than books. If I

catched the schoolmaster lockin' up they boys in their play-hours, my

word but I'd send him fleein'!"

He was most indignant with this school-master, although he was to be of

his own "waling." He was determined that the lads should have their

play, lessons or no lessons. Green apples he preferred to Greek. The

dominie would have to look out.

"Do you think, ma'am," he says, in an insidious manner; "do ye think she

would like to have a furnished house in London for pairt of the year?

She might have her friends to see----"

Now at last this is too much. The gentle, small creature has been

listening with a fine, proud, hurt air on her face, and with tears near

to her eyes. Is it thus that her Scotch student, of whom she is the

fierce champion, is to be thrust aside?

"Why," she says, with an indignant warmth; "you take it all for granted!

I thought it was a joke. Do you really think your nephew is going to

marry Mary? And Angus Sutherland in love with her!"

"God bless me!" exclaimed the Laird, with such a start that the bulky

_Municipal London_ banged down on the cabin floor.

Was it the picking up of that huge tome, or the consciousness that he

had been betrayed into an unusual ejaculation, that crimsoned the

Laird's face? When he sate upright again, however, wonder was the chief

expression visible in his eyes.

"Of course I have no right to say so," she instantly and hurriedly adds:

"it is only a guess--a suspicion. But haven't you seen it? And until

quite recently I had other suspicions, too. Why, what do you think

would induce a man in Angus Sutherland's position to spend such a long

time in idleness?"

But by this time the Laird had recovered his equanimity. He was not to

be disturbed by any bogie. He smiled serenely.

"We will see, ma'am; we will see. If it is so with the young man, it is

a peety. But you must admit yourself that ye see how things are likely

to turn out?"

"I don't know," she said, with reluctance: she would not admit that she

had been grievously troubled during the past few days. "Very well,

ma'am, very well," said the Laird, blithely. "We will see who is right.

I am not a gambler, but I would wager ye a gold ring, a sixpence, and a

silver thimble that I am no so far out. I have my eyes open; oh, aye!

Now I am going on deck to see where we are."

And so the Laird rose, and put the bulky volume by, and passed along the

saloon to the companion. We heard

_Sing tantara! Sing tantara!_

as his head appeared. He was in a gay humour.

Meanwhile the _White Dove_, with all sail set, had come along at a

spanking pace. The weather threatened change, it is true; there was a

deep gloom overhead; but along the southern horizon there was a blaze of

yellow light which had the odd appearance of being a sunset in the

middle of the day; and in this glare lay the long blue promontory known

as the Rhinns of Islay, within sight of the Irish coast. And so we went

down by Easdail, and past Colipoll and its slate-quarries; and we knew

this constant breeze would drive us through the swirls of the Dorus

Mohr--the "Great Gate." And were we listening, as we drew near in the

afternoon to the rose-purple bulk of Scarba, for the low roar of

Corrievrechan? We knew the old refrain:--

_As you pass through Jura's Sound_

_Bend your course by Scarba's shore;_

_Shun, oh, shun the gulf profound_

_Where Corrievrechan's surges roar!_

But now there is no ominous murmur along those distant shores. Silence

and a sombre gloom hang over the two islands. We are glad to shun this

desolate coast; and glad that the _White Dove_ is carrying us away to

the pleasanter south, when, behold! behold! another sight! As we open

out the dreaded gulf, Corrievrechan itself becomes but an open lane

leading out to the west; and there, beyond the gloom, amid the golden

seas, lies afar the music-haunted Colonsay! It is the calm of the

afternoon; the seas lie golden around the rocks; surely the sailors can

hear her singing now for the lover she lost so long ago! What is it

that thrills the brain so, and fills the eyes with tears, when we can

hear no sound at all coming over the sea?

It is the Laird who summons us back to actualities.

"It would be a strange thing," says he, "if Tom Galbraith were in that

island at this very meenit. Ah'm sure he was going there."

And Captain John helps.

"I not like to go near Corrievrechan," he says, with a grin, "when there

is a flood tide and half a gale from the sou'-west. It is an ahfu'

place," he adds, more seriously, "an ahfu' place."

"I should like to go through," Angus Sutherland says, quite

inadvertently.

"Aye, would ye, sir?" says Captain John, eagerly. "If there wass only

you and me on board, I would tek you through ferry well--with the wind

from the norrard and an ebb tide. Oh, yes! I would do that; and maybe

we will do it this year yet!"

"I do not think I am likely to see Corrievrechan again this year," said

he, quite quietly--so quietly that scarcely any one heard. But Mary

Avon heard.

Well, we managed, after all, to bore through the glassy swirls of the

Dorus Mohr--the outlying pickets, as it were, of the fiercer whirlpools

and currents of Corrievrechan--and the light breeze still continuing we

crept along in the evening past Crinan, and along the lonely coast of

Knapdale, with the giant Paps of Jura darkening in the west. Night

fell; the breeze almost died away; we turned the bow of the _White Dove_

towards an opening in the land, and the flood tide gently bore her into

the wide, silent, empty loch. There did not seem to be any light on the

shores. Like a tall, grey phantom the yacht glided through the gloom;

we were somewhat silent on deck.

But there was a radiant yellow glow coming through the skylight; and

Master Fred had done his best to make the saloon cheerful enough. And

where there is supper there ought to be other old-fashioned

institutions--singing, for example; and how long was it since we had

heard anything about the Queen's Maries, or "Ho, ro, clansmen!" or the

Irish Brigade? Nobody, however, appeared to think of these things.

This was a silent and lonely loch, and the gloom of night was over land

and water; but we still seemed to have before our eyes the far island

amid the golden seas. And was there not still lingering in the night

air some faint echo of the song of Colonsay? It is a heart-breaking

song; it is all about the parting of lovers.

*CHAPTER XIV.*

*A SUNDAY IN FAR SOLITUDES.*

Mary Avon is seated all alone on deck, looking rather wistfully around

her at this solitary Loch-na-Chill--that is, the Loch of the Burying

Place. It is Sunday morning, and there is a more than Sabbath peace

dwelling over sea and shore. Not a ripple on the glassy sea; a pale

haze of sunshine on the islands in the south; a stillness as of death

along the low-lying coast. A seal rises to the surface of the calm sea,

and regards her for a moment with his soft black eyes; then slowly

subsides. She has not seen him; she is looking far away.

Then a soft step is heard on the companion; and the manner of the girl

instantly changes. Are these tears that she hastily brushes aside? But

her face is all smiles to welcome her friend. She declares that she is

charmed with the still beauty of this remote and solitary loch.

Then other figures appear; and at last we are all summoned on deck for

morning service. It is not an elaborate ceremony; there are no candles,

or genuflexions, or embroidered altar-cloths. But the Laird has put on

a black frock coat, and the men have put aside their scarlet cowls and

wear smart sailor-looking cloth caps. Then the Laird gravely rises, and

opens his book.

Sometimes, it is true, our good friend has almost driven us to take

notice of his accent, and we have had our little jokes on board about

it; but you do not pay much heed to these peculiarities when the strong

and resonant voice--amid the strange silence of this Loch of the Burying

Place--reads out the 103rd Psalm: "Like as a father peetieth his

children," he may say; but one does not heed that. And who is to notice

that, as he comes to these words, he lifts his eyes from the book and

fixes them for a moment on Mary Avon's downcast face? "Like as a father

pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him. For He

knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust. As for man, his days

are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind

passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no

more. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon

them that fear Him, and His righteousness unto children's children."

Then, when he had finished the Psalm, he turned to the New Testament,

and read in the same slow and reverent manner the 6th chapter of

Matthew. This concluded the service; it was not an elaborate one.

Then, about an hour afterwards, the Laird, on being appealed to by his

hostess, gave it as his opinion that there would be no Sabbath

desecration at all in our going ashore to examine the ruins of what

appeared to be an ancient chapel, which we could make out by the aid of

our glasses on the green slope above the rocks. And as our young

friends--Angus and the Youth--idly paddled us away from the yacht, the

Laird began to apologise to his hostess for not having lengthened the

service by the exposition of some chosen text.

"Ye see, ma'am," he observed, "some are gifted in that way, and some

not. My father, now, had an amazing power of expounding and

explaining--I am sure there was nothing in _Hutcheson's Exposeetion_ he

had not in his memory. A very famous man he was in those days as an

Anti-Lifter--very famous; there were few who could argue with him on

that memorable point."

"But what did you call him, sir?" asks his hostess, with some vague

notion that the Laird's father had lived in the days of body-snatchers.

"An Anti-Lifter: it was a famous controversy; but ye are too young to

remember of it perhaps. And now in these days we are more tolerant, and

rightly so; I do not care whether the minister lifts the sacramental

bread before distribution or not, now that there is no chance of Popery

getting into our Presbyterian Church in disguise. It is the speerit,

not the form, that is of importance: our Church authoritatively declares

that the efficacy of the sacraments depends not 'upon any virtue in them

or in him that doth administer them.' Aye; that is the cardinal truth.

But in those days they considered it right to guard against Popery in

every manner; and my father was a prominent Anti-Lifter; and well would

he argue and expound on that and most other doctrinal subjects. But I

have not much gift that way," added the Laird, modestly; quite

forgetting with what clearness he had put before us the chief features

of the great Semple case.

"I don't think you have anything to regret, sir," said our young Doctor,

as he carelessly worked the oar with one hand, "that you did not bother

the brains of John and his men with any exposition of the Sermon on the

Mount. Isn't it an odd thing that the common fishermen and boatmen of

the Sea of Galilee understood the message Christ brought them just at

once? and now a days, when we have millions of churches built, and

millions of money being spent, and tons upon tons of sermons being

written every year, we seem only to get further and further into

confusion and chaos. Fancy the great army of able-bodied men that go on

expounding and expounding; and the learning and time and trouble they

bestow on their work; and scarcely any two of them agreed; while the

people who listen to them are all in a fog. Simon Peter, and Andrew, and

the sons of Zebedee, must have been men of the most extraordinary

intellect. They understood at once; they were commissioned to teach;

and they had not even a Shorter Catechism to go by."

The Laird looked at him doubtfully. He did not know whether to

recognise in him a true ally or not. However, the mention of the

Shorter Catechism seemed to suggest solid ground; and he was just about

entering into the question of the Subordinate Standards when an

exclamation of rage on the part of his nephew startled us. That

handsome lad, during all this theological discussion, had been keeping a

watchful and matter-of-fact eye on a number of birds on the shore; and

now that we were quite close to the sandy promontory, he had recognised

them.

"Look! look!" he said, in tones of mingled eagerness and disappointment.

"Golden plovers, every one of them! Isn't it too bad? It's always like

this on Sunday. I will bet you won't get within half a mile of them

to-morrow!"

And he refused to be consoled as we landed on the sandy shore; and found

the golden-dusted, long-legged birds running along before us, or

flitting from patch to patch of the moist greensward. We had to leave

him behind in moody contemplation as we left the shore and scrambled up

the rugged and rocky slope to the ruins of this solitary little chapel.

There was an air of repose and silence about these crumbling walls and

rusted gates that was in consonance with a habitation of the dead. And

first of all, outside, we came upon an upright Iona cross, elaborately

carved with strange figures of men and beasts. But inside the small

building, lying prostrate among the grass and weeds, there was a

collection of those memorials that would have made an antiquarian's

heart leap for joy. It is to be feared that our guesses about the

meaning of the emblems on the tombstones were of a crude and superficial

character. Were these Irish chiefs, those stone figures with the long

sword and the harp beside them? Was the recurrent shamrock a national

or religious emblem? And why was the effigy of this ancient worthy

accompanied by a pair of pincers, an object that looked like a

tooth-comb, and a winged griffin? Again, outside but still within the

sacred walls, we came upon still further tombs of warriors, most of them

hidden among the long grass; and here and there we tried to brush the

weeds away. It was no bad occupation for a Sunday morning, in this

still and lonely burial-place above the wide seas.

On going on board again we learned from John of Skye that there were

many traces of an ancient ecclesiastical colonisation about this coast;

and that in especial there were a ruined chapel and other remains on one

of a small group of islands that we could see on the southern horizon.

Accordingly, after luncheon, we fitted out an expedition to explore that

distant island. The Youth was particularly anxious to examine these

ecclesiastical remains; he did not explain to everybody that he had

received from Captain John a hint that the shores of this sainted island

swarmed with seals.

And now the gig is shoved off; the four oars strike the glassy water;

and away we go in search of the summer isles in the south. The Laird

settles himself comfortably in the stern; it seems but natural that he

should take Mary Avon's hand in his, just as if she were a little child.

"And ye must know, Miss Mary," he says, quite cheerfully, "that if ever

ye should come to live in Scotland, ye will not be persecuted with our

theology. No, no; far from it; we respect every one's religion, if it

is sincere; though we cling to our own. And why should we not cling to

it, and guard it from error? We have had to fight for our civil and

religious leeberties inch by inch, foot by foot; and we have won. The

blood of the saints has not been shed in vain. The cry of the dying and

wounded on many a Lanarkshire moor--when the cavalry were riding about,

and hewing and slaughtering--was not wasted on the air! The Lord heard,

and answered. And we do well to guard what we have gained; and, if need

were, there are plenty of Scotsmen alive at this day who would freely

spend their lives in defending their own releegion. But ye need not

fear. These are the days of great toleration. Ye might live in

Scotland all your life, and not hear an ill word said of the Episcopal

Church!"

After having given this solemn assurance the Laird cast a glance of sly

humour at Angus Sutherland.

"I will confess," said he, "when Dr. Sutherland brought that up this

morning about Peter and Andrew, and James and John, I was a bit put out.

But then," he added, triumphantly, "ye must remember that in those days

they had not the inseedious attacks of Prelacy to guard against. There

was no need for them to erect bulwarks of the faith. But in our time it

is different, or rather it has been different. I am glad to think that

we of the Scotch Church are emancipated from the fear of Rome; and I am

of opeenion that with the advancing times they are in the right who

advocate a little moderation in the way of applying and exacting the

Standards. No, no; I am not for bigotry. I assure ye, Miss Mary, ye

will find far fewer bigots in Scotland than people say."

"I have not met any, sir," remarks Miss Mary.

"I tell ye what," said he, solemnly; "I am told on good authority that

there is a movement among the U. P. Presbytery to send up to the Synod a

sort of memorial with regard to the Subordinate Standards--that is, ye

know, the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Larger and Shorter

Catechisms--just hinting, in a mild sort of way, that these are of human

composition, and necessarily imperfect; and that a little amount

of--of----"

The Laird could not bring himself to pronounce the word "laxity." He

stammered and hesitated, and at last said--

"Well; a little judeecious liberality of construction--do ye see?--on

certain points is admissible, while clearly defining other points on

which the Church will not admit of question. However, as I was saying,

we have little fear of Popery in the Presbyterian Church now; and ye

would have no need to fear it in your English Church if the English

people were not so sorely wanting in humour. If they had any sense of

fun they would have laughed those millinery, play-acting people out o'

their Church long ago----"

But at this moment it suddenly strikes the Laird that a fair proportion

of the people he is addressing are of the despised English race; and he

hastily puts in a disclaimer.

"I meant the clergy, of course," says he, most unblushingly, "the

English clergy, as having no sense of humour at all--none at all. Dear

me, what a stupid man I met at Dunoon last year! There were some people

on board the steamer talking about Homesh--ye know, he was known to

every man who travelled up and down the Clyde--and they told the English

clergyman about Homesh wishing he was a stot. 'Wishing he was a what?'

says he. Would ye believe it, it took about ten meenutes to explain the

story to him bit by bit; and at the end of it his face was as blank as a

bannock before it is put on the girdle!"

We could see the laughter brimming in the Laird's eyes; he was thinking

either of the stot or some other story about Homesh. But his reverence

for Sunday prevailed. He fell back on the Standards; and was most

anxious to assure Miss Avon that, if ever she were to live in Scotland,

she would suffer no persecution at all, even though she still determined

to belong to the Episcopal Church.

"We have none in the neighbourhood of Strathgovan," he remarked, quite

simply; "but ye could easily drive in to Glasgow"--and he did not notice

the quick look of surprise and inquiry that Angus Sutherland immediately

directed from the one to the other. But Mary Avon was poking down.

It was a long pull; but by and by the features of the distant island

became clearer; and we made out an indentation that probably meant a

creek of some sort. But what was our surprise, as we drew nearer and

nearer to what we supposed to be an uninhabited island, to find the

topmast of a vessel appearing over some rocks that guard the entrance to

the bay? As we pulled into the still waters, and passed the heavy black

smack lying at anchor, perhaps the two solitary creatures in charge of

her were no less surprised at the appearance of strangers in these

lonely waters. They came ashore just as we landed. They explained, in

more or less imperfect English, that they were lobster-fishers; and that

this was a convenient haven tor their smack, while they pulled in their

small boat round the shores to look after the traps. And if--when the

Laird was not looking--his hostess privately negotiated for the sale of

half-a-dozen live lobsters, and if young Smith also took a quiet

opportunity of inquiring about the favourite resorts of the seals; what

then? Mice will play when they get the chance. The Laird was walking

on with Mary Avon; and was telling her about the Culdees.

And all the time we wandered about the deserted island, and explored its

ruins, and went round its bays, the girl kept almost exclusively with

the Laird, or with her other and gentle friend; and Angus had but little

chance of talking to her or walking with her. He was left pretty much

alone. Perhaps he was not greatly interested in the ecclesiastical

remains. But he elicited from the two lobster-fishers that the hay

scattered on the floor of the chapel was put there by fishermen, who

used the place to sleep in when they came to the island. And they

showed him the curious tombstone of the saint, with its sculptured

elephant and man on horseback. Then he went away by himself to trace

out the remains of a former civilisation on the island; the withered

stumps of a blackthorn hedge, and the abundant nettle. A big rat ran

out; the only visible tenant of the crumbled habitation.

Meanwhile the others had climbed to the summit of the central hill; and

behold! all around the smooth bays were black and shining objects, like

the bladders used on fishermen's nets. But these moved this way and

that; sometimes there was a big splash as one disappeared. The Youth

sate and regarded this splendid hunting-ground with a breathless

interest.

"I'm thinking ye ought to get your sealskin to-morrow, Miss Mary," says

the Laird, for once descending to worldly things.

"Oh, I hope no one will be shot for me!" she said. "They are such

gentle creatures."

"But young men will be young men, ye know," said he, cheerfully. "When

I was Howard's age, and knew I had a gun within reach, a sight like that

would have made my heart jump."

"Yes," said the nephew; "but you never do have a sight like that when

you have a rifle within reach."

"Wait till to-morrow--wait till to-morrow," said the Laird, cheerfully.

"And now we will go down to the boat. It is a long pull back to the

yacht."

But the Laird's nephew got even more savage as we rowed back in the

calm, pale twilight. Those wild duck would go whirring by within easy

shot--apparently making away to the solitudes of Loch Swen. Then that

greyish-yellow thing on the rocks--could it be a sheep? We watched it

for several minutes, as the gig went by in the dusk; then, with a heavy

plunge or two, the seal floundered down and into the water. The splash

echoed through the silence.

"Did you ever see the like of that?" the Youth exclaimed, mortified

beyond endurance. "Did you ever? As big as a cow! And as sure as you

get such a chance, it is Sunday!"

"I am very glad," says Miss Avon. "I hope no one will shoot a seal on

my account."

"The seal ought to be proud to have such a fate," said the Laird,

gallantly. "Ye are saving him from a miserable and lingering death of

cold, or hunger, or old age. And whereas in that case nobody would care

anything or see anything more about him, ye give him a sort of

immortality in your dining-room, and ye are never done admiring him. A

proud fellow he ought to be. And if the seals about here are no very

fine in their skins, still it would be a curiosity, and at present we

have not one at all at Denny-mains."

Again this reference to Denny-mains: Angus Sutherland glanced from one

to the other; but what could he see in the dusk?

Then we got back to the yacht: what a huge grey ghost she looked in the

gloom! And as we were all waiting to get down the companion, Angus

Sutherland put his hand on his hostess's arm, and stayed her.

"You must be wrong," said he, simply. "I have offended her somehow.

She has not spoken ten words to me to-day."

*CHAPTER XV.*

*HIDDEN SPRINGS.*

"Well, perhaps it is better, after all," says a certain person, during

one of those opportunities for brief conjugal confidences that are

somewhat rare on board ship. She sighs as she speaks. "I thought it

was going to be otherwise. But it will be all the better for Angus not

to marry for some years to come. He has a great future before him; and a

wife would really be an encumbrance. Young professional men should

never marry; their circumstances keep on improving, but they can't

improve their wives."

All this is very clear and sensible. It is not always that this person

talks in so matter-of-fact a way. If, however, everything has turned

out for the best, why this sudden asperity with which she adds--

"But I did not expect it of Mary."

And then again--

"She might at least be civil to him."

"She is not uncivil to him. She only avoids him."

"I consider that her open preference for Howard Smith is just a little

bit too ostentatious," she says, in rather an injured way. "Indeed, if

it comes to that, she would appear to prefer the Laird to either of

them. Any stranger would think she wanted to marry Denny-mains

himself."

"Has it ever occurred to you," is the respectful question, "that a young

woman--say once in a century--may be in that state of mind in which she

would prefer not to marry anybody?"

Abashed? Not a bit of it! There is a calm air of superiority on her

face: she is above trifles and taunts.

"If unmarried women had any sense," she says, "that would be their

normal state of mind."

And she might have gone on enlarging on this text, only that at this

moment Mary Avon comes along from the ladies' cabin; and the morning

greetings take place between the two women. Is it only a suspicion that

there is a touch of coldness in the elder woman's manner? Is it possible

that her love for Mary Avon may be decreasing by ever so little a bit?

Then Angus comes down the companion: he has got some wild flowers; he

has been ashore. And surely he ought to give them to the younger of the

two women: she is of the age when such pretty compliments are a natural

thing. But no. The flowers are for his hostess--for the decoration of

her table; and Mary Avon does not look up as they are handed along.

Then young Mr. Smith makes his appearance; he has been ashore too. And

his complaints and protests fill the air.

"Didn't I tell you?" he says, appealing more especially to the

women-folk for sympathy. "Didn't I tell you? You saw all those golden

plover yesterday, and the wild duck further up the loch: there is not a

sign of one of them! I knew it would be so. As sure as Monday begins,

you never get a chance! I will undertake to say that when we get to

those islands where all the seals were yesterday, we sha'n't see one

to-day!"

"But are we to stop here a whole day in order to let you go and shoot

seals?" says his hostess.

"You can't help it," says he, laughing. "There isn't any wind."

"Angus," she says--as if nobody knew anything about the wind but the

young Doctor--"is that so?"

"Not a doubt of it," he says. "But it is a beautiful day. You might

make up a luncheon-party, and have a pic-nic by the side of the Saint's

Well--down in the hollow, you know."

"Much chance I shall have with the seals, then!" remarks the other young

man, good-naturedly enough.

However, it is enough that the suggestion has come from Angus

Sutherland. A pic-nic on the Island of the Saints is forthwith

commanded--seals or no seals. And while Master Fred, immediately after

breakfast, begins his preparations, the Laird helps by carefully putting

a corkscrew in his pocket. It is his invariable custom. We are ready

for any emergency.

And if the golden plover, and mergansers, and seals appear to know that

the new, busy, brisk working-days have begun again, surely we ought to

know it too. Here are the same silent shores; and the calm blue seas

and blue sky; and the solitary islands in the south--all just as they

were yesterday; but we have a secret sense that the lassitude and

idleness of Sunday are over, and that there is something of freedom in

the air. The Laird has no longer any need to keep a check on his

tongue: those stories about Homesh may bubble up to the surface of his

mind just as they please. And indeed he is exceedingly merry and

facetious as the preparations go on for this excursion. When at length

he gets into the stern of the boat he says to his companion--

_"There was Mary Beaton, and Mary Seaton,_

_And Mary Avon, and me._

--What ails ye, lass? I have not heard much of your singing of late."

"You would not have me sing profane songs on Sunday?" she says,

demurely.

"No; but I mean long before Sunday. However," he says, cheerfully, and

looking at her, "there is a wonderful change in ye--wonderful! Well do

I mind the day I first saw ye, on the quay; though it seems a long time

since then. Ye were a poor white bit thing then; I was astonished; and

the next day too, when ye were lame as well, I said to myself, 'Well;

it's high time that bit lass had a breath o' the sea air.' And now--why

ye just mind me o' the lasses in the Scotch songs--the country lasses,

ye know--with the fine colour on your face."

And indeed this public statement did not tend to decrease the sun-brown

that now tinged Mary Avon's cheeks.

"These lads," said he--no doubt referring to his nephew and to Angus

Sutherland, who were both labouring at the long oars--"are much too

attentive to ye, putting ye under the shadow of the sails, and bringing

ye parasols and things like that. No, no; don't you be afraid of

getting sun-burned; it is a comely and wholesome thing: is it not

reasonable that human beings need the sunlight as much as plants? Just

ask your friend Dr. Sutherland that; though a man can guess as much

without a microscope. Keep ye in the sun, Miss Mary; never mind the

brown on your cheeks, whatever the young men say: I can tell ye ye are

looking a great deal better now than when ye stepped on shore--a shilpit

pale bit thing--on that afternoon."

Miss Avon had not been in the habit of receiving lectures like this

about her complexion, and she seemed rather confused; but fortunately

the measured noise of the rowlocks prevented the younger men from

overhearing.

_"There was Mary Beaton, and Mary Seaton,_

_And Mary Avon, and me."--_

continued the Laird, in his facetious way; and he contentedly patted the

hand of the girl beside him. "I fear I am growing very fond of

idleness."

"I am sure, sir, you are so busy during the rest of the year," says this

base flatterer, "that you should be able to enjoy a holiday with a clear

conscience."

"Well, perhaps so--perhaps so," said the Laird, who was greatly pleased.

"And yet, let one work as hard as one can, it is singular how little one

can do, and what little thanks ye get for doing it. I am sure those

people in Strathgovan spend half their lives in fault-finding; and

expect ye to do everything they can think of without asking them for a

farthing. At the last meeting of the ratepayers in the Burgh Hall I

heckled them, I can tell ye. I am not a good speaker--no, no; far from

it; but I can speak plain. I use words that can be driven into people's

heads; and I will say this, that some o' those people in Strathgovan

have a skull of most extraordinar' thickness. But said I to them, 'Do ye

expect us to work miracles? Are we to create things out of nothing? If

the rates are not to be increased, where are the new gas-lamps to come

from? Do ye think we can multiply gas-lamps as the loaves and fishes

were multiplied?' I'm thinking," added the Laird, with a burst of

hearty laughter, "that the thickest-skulled of them all understood

that--eh?"

"I should hope so," remarked Miss Avon.

Then the measured rattle of the oars: it wants hard pulling against this

fiercely running tide; indeed, to cheat it in a measure, we have to keep

working along the coast and across the mouth of Loch Swen.

_"There was Mary Beaton, and Mary Seaton,_

_And Mary Avon, and me"--_

says the Laird, as a playful introduction to another piece of talking.

"I have been asking myself once or twice whether I know any one in the

whole kingdom of Scotland better than you."

"Than me, sir?" she says, with a start of surprise.

"Yes," he says, sententiously. "That is so. And I have had to answer

myself in the naygative. It is wonderful how ye get to know a person on

board a yacht. I just feel as if I had spent years and years with ye;

so that there is not any one I know with whom I am better acquaint.

When ye come to Denny-mains, I shall be quite disappointed if ye look

surprised or strange to the place. I have got it into my head that ye

must have lived there all your life. Will ye undertake to say," he

continues, in the same airy manner, "that ye do not know the little

winding path that goes up through the trees to the flag-staff--eh?"

"I'm afraid I don't remember it," she says, with a smile.

"Wait till ye see the sunsets ye can see from there!" he says, proudly.

"We can see right across Glasgow to Tennants' Stalk; and in the

afternoon the smoke is all turning red and brown with the sunset--many's

and many's the time I have taken Tom Galbraith to the hill, and asked

him whether they have finer sunsets at Naples or Venice. No, no; give

me fire and smoke and meestery for a strong sunset. But just the best

time of the year, as ye'll find out"--and here he looked in a kindly way

at the girl--"where there is a bit wood near the house, is the

spring-time. When ye see the primroses and the blue-bells about the

roots of the trees--when ye see them so clear and bright among the red

of the withered leaves--well, ye cannot help thinking about some of our

old Scotch songs, and there's something in that that's just like to

bring the tears to your een. We have a wonderful and great inheritance

in these songs, as ye'll find out, my lass. You English know only of

Burns; but a Scotchman, who is familiar with the ways and the feelings

and the speech of the peasantry, has a sort o' uncomfortable impression

that Burns is at times just a bit artifeecial and leeterary--especially

when he is masquerading in fine English; though at other times ye get

the real lilt--what a man would sing to himself when he was all alone at

the plough, in the early morning, and listening to the birds around him.

But there are others that we are proud of, too--Tannahill, and John

Mayne, that wrote about _Logan Braes_; and Hogg, and Motherwell: I'm

sure o' this, that when ye read Motherwell's _Jeanie Morrison_, ye'll no

be able to go on for greetin'."

"I beg your pardon?" said Miss Avon.

But the Laird is too intent on recalling some of the lines to notice

that she has not quite understood him.

"They were school-mates," he says, in an absent way. "When school was

over, they wandered away like lad and lass; and he writes the poem in

after-life, and speaks to her he has never seen since.

_"Oh, mind ye, love, how oft we left_

_The deavin' dinsome toun,_

_To wander by the green burn-side,_

_And hear its water croon?_

_The simmer leaves hung ower our heads,_

_The flowers burst round our feet;_

_And in the gloamin' o the wood_

_The throssil whistled sweet._

* * * * *

_"And on the knowe aboon the burn_

_For hours thegither sat_

_In the silentness o' joy, till baith_

_Wi' very gladness grat!_

_Aye, aye, dear Jeanie Morrison,_

_Tears trinkled down your cheek,_

_Like dew-beads on a rose, yet nane_

_Had ony power to speak!"_

The Laird's voice faltered for a moment; but he pretended he had great

difficulty in remembering the poem, and confessed that he must have

mixed up the verses. However, he said he remembered the last one.

_"O dear, dear Jeanie Morrison,_

_Since we were sundered young,_

_I've never seen your face, nor heard_

_The music of your tongue;_

_But I could hug all wretchedness,_

_And happy could I dee,_

_Did I but ken your heart still dreamed_

_O' bygane days and me!"_

Just as he finished, the old Laird turned aside his head. He seemed to

be suddenly interested in something over at the mouth of Loch Swen.

Then he quickly passed his red silk handkerchief across his face, and

said, in a gay manner--though he was still looking in that alien

direction--

"This is a desperate hard pull. We had nothing like this yesterday.

But it will do the lads good; it will take the stiffness out of their

backs."

However, one of the lads--to wit, the Laird's nephew--admitted at length

that he had had quite enough of it, and gave up his oar to the man he

had relieved. Then he came into the stern, and was very pleasant and

talkative; and said he had quite made up his mind to find all the seals

gone from the shores of the sacred island.

So formidable, indeed, was the tide, that we had to keep well away to

the south of the island before venturing to make across for it; and when

at length we did put the bow straight for the little harbour, the

mid-channel current swept us away northward, as if the gig had been a

bit of cork. But the four oars kept manfully to their work; and by dint

of hard pulling and pertinacious steering we managed to run into the

little bay.

We found it quite deserted. The two lobster-fishers had left in the

morning; we were in sole possession of this lonely island, set amid the

still summer seas.

But by this time it was nearly noon; and so it was arranged that the men

of the party should content themselves with a preliminary expedition, to

find out, by stealthy crawlings out to the various bays, where the seals

were chiefly congregated; while the women were to remain by the Saints'

Well, to help Fred to get luncheon spread out and arranged. And this

was done; and thus it happened that, after Master Fred had finished his

work, and retired down to his mates in the gig, the two women-folk were

left alone.

"Why, Mary," said the one of them, quite cheerfully (as we afterwards

heard), "it is quite a long time since you and I had a chat together."

"Yes, it is."

"One gets so often interfered with on board, you know. Aren't you going

to begin now and make a sketch?"

She had brought with her her sketching materials; but they were lying

unopened on a rock hard by.

"No, I think not," she said, listlessly.

"What is the matter with you?" said her kind friend, pretending to laugh

at her. "I believe you are fretting over the loss of the money, after

all."

"Oh, no: I hope you do not think I am fretting!" said she, anxiously.

"No one has said that? I am really quite content--I am very--happy."

She managed to say the word.

"I am very glad to hear it," said her friend; "but I have a great mind

to scold you all the same."

The girl looked up. Her friend went over to her, and sate down beside

her, and took her hand in hers.

"Don't be offended, Mary," she said, good-naturedly. "I have no right

to interfere; but Angus is an old friend of mine. Why do you treat him

like that?"

The girl looked at her with a sort of quick, frightened, inquiring

glance; and then said--as if she were almost afraid to hear herself

speak--

"Has he spoken to you?"

"Yes. Now don't make a mole-hill into a mountain, Mary. If he has

offended you, tell him. Be frank with him. He would not vex you for

the world: do you think he would?"

The girl's hand was beginning to tremble a good deal; and her face was

white, and piteous.

"If you only knew him as well as I do, you would know he is as gentle as

a child: he would not offend any one. Now, you will be friends with him

again, Mary?"

The answer was a strange one. The girl broke into a fit of wild crying,

and hid her face in her friend's bosom, and sobbed there so that her

whole frame was shaken with the violence of her misery.

"Mary, what is it?" said the other, in great alarm.

Then, by and by, the girl rose, and went away over to her sketching

materials for a minute or two. Then she returned: her face still rather

white, but with a certain cold and determined look on it.

"It is all a mistake," said she, speaking very distinctly. "Dr.

Sutherland has not offended me in the least: please tell him so if he

speaks again. I hope we shall always be good friends."

She opened out her colour-box.

"And then," said she, with an odd laugh, "before you think I have gone

crazed, please remember it isn't every day one loses such an enormous

fortune as mine."

She began to get her other sketching things ready. And she was very

cheerful about it, and very busy; and she was heard to be singing to

herself--

_Then fill up a bumper: what can I do less_

_Than drink to the health of my bonny Black Bess?_

But her friend, when by chance she turned her head a little bit,

perceived that the pale and piteous face was still wet with tears; and

the praises of Black Bess did not wholly deceive her.

END OF VOL. II.

LONDON: R. CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOR, BREAD STREET HILL.

* * * * * * * *

*NOVELS BY WILLIAM BLACK.*

MACLEOD OF DARE.

THE STRANGE ADVENTURES OF A PHAETON.

A PRINCESS OF THULE.

MADCAP VIOLET.

GREEN PASTURES AND PICCADILLY.

THE MAID OF KILLEENA, and other Tales.

MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON.