William Black

“ Sheila knew that the blood was mantling in her cheeks; that her heart was full of joy; that her whole frame so tingled with life and spirit that, had she been in Borva, she would have challenged her deerhound to a race, and fled down the side of the hill with him to the small bay of white sand below the house. She did not pause for a minute when she reached the hotel. She went up the steps, opened the door, and entered the square hall. There was an odor of tobacco in the place, and several gentlemen standing about rather confused her, for she had to glance at them in looking for a waiter. ”

“ The island of Borva lay warm and green and bright under a blue sky; there were no white curls of foam on Loch Roag, but only the long Atlantic swell coming in to fall on the white beach; away over there in the South the fine grays and purples of the giant Suainabhal shone in the sunlight amid the clear air; and the beautiful sea-pyots flew about the rocks, their screaming being the only sound audible in the stillness. The King of Borva was down by the shore, seated on a stool, and engaged in the idyllic operation of painting a boat which had been hauled up on the sand. ”

“ Sometimes, too, a touch of color added warmth to the complexion, put a glimmer of the blue sea beneath the long, black eyelashes, and drew a thread of scarlet around the white neck.
But was this Sheila? Could he take this sheet of paper to his friends in London and say, Here is the magical princess whom I hope to bring to you from the North, with all the glamour of the sea around her? He felt instinctively that there would be an awkward pause. The people would praise the handsome, frank, courageous head, and look upon the bit of red ribbon around the neck as an effective artistic touch. ”

“ What would become of us if we could not say, at some particular point of our lives, to the by-gone time, that we had left it, with all its errors and blunders and follies, behind us, and would, with the help of God, start clear on a new sort of life? What would it be if there were no forgetfulness for any of us—no kindly vail to come down and shut out the memory of what we have done—if the staring record were to be kept forever before our eyes? And you are a woman, Sheila; it should be easy for you to forgive and to encourage, and to hope for better things of the man you love? ”

“ The Hebrides received them with fair sunshine and smooth seas, and all the day long their occupation was but to watch the wild birds flying from island to island, and mark the gliding by of the beautiful coasts, and listen to the light rushing of the waves as the fresh sea-breeze flew through the rigging. And Sheila was proud to teach them something of the mystery of sailing a small craft, and would give them the tiller sometimes, while her eye, as clear and keen as her father’s, kept watch and ward over the shapely vessel that was making for the Northern seas. ”

“ He does not see those things in the eyes of women he is not in love with; but when, in after years, he is carelessly regarding this or the other woman, some chance look, some brief and sudden turn of expression, will recall to him, as with a stroke of lightning, all the old wonder-time, and his heart will go nigh to breaking to think that he has grown old, and that he has forgotten so much, and that the fair, wild days of romance and longing are passed away forever.
“Ingram thinks I don’t understand you yet, Sheila,” he said to her, after they had got home and their friends had gone. ”

“ The dingy trees in Euston Square, the pale sunlight that shone down on the gray pavements, the noise of the omnibuses and carts, the multitude of strangers, the blue and mist-like smoke that hung about Tottenham Court Road—all were as strange to them as the sensation of sitting in a hansom and being driven along by an unseen driver. Lavender confessed afterward that he was pervaded by an odd sort of desire to know whether there was anybody in London at all like Sheila. Now and again a smartly-dressed girl passed along the pavement ”

“ The sea-birds dipped and disappeared as the big boat churned its way onward. A white solan, far away by the shores of Mull, struck the water as he dived, and sent a jet of spray into the air. Colonsay and Oronsay became as faint clouds on the Southern horizon, the jagged coast of Lorne drew near. And then they went up through the Sound of Kerrara and steamed into the broad and beautiful bay of Oban, and behold! here was Sheila on the pier, already waving a handkerchief to them, while her husband held her arm, lest in her excitement she should go too near the edge of the quay. ”

“ Sheila had got a sweetheart, and Lavender saw it and smiled good-naturedly. The awe and reverence with which this lad regarded the beautiful woman beside him, was something new and odd in Kensington Gardens. Yet it was the way of those boys. He had himself had his imaginative fits of worship, in which some very ordinary young woman, who ate a good breakfast and spent an hour and a half in arranging her hair before going out, was regarded as some beautiful goddess fresh risen from the sea, or descended from the clouds. Young Mosenberg was just at the proper age for these foolish dreams. ”

“ How could I go back to the Lewis, Mairi? They would look at me. They would ask questions. My father would come down to the quay, and he would say: ‘Sheila, have you come back alone?’ And all the story of it would go about the island, and every one would say I had been a bad wife, and my husband had gone away from me.”
“There is not any one,” said Mairi, with the tears starting to her eyes again—“not from one end of sa island to sa other—would say that of you, Miss Sheila; and there is no one would not come to meet you, and be glad sat you will come again to your own home. ”

“ They could hear the curlew whistling and the plover calling amid that monotonous plash of the waves that murmured all around the coast. When they returned to the house the darker waters of the Atlantic and the purple clouds of the West were shut out of sight, and before them there was only the liquid plain of Loch Roag, with its pathway of yellow fire, and far away on the other side the shoulders and peaks of the Southern mountains, that had grown gray and clear and sharp in the beautiful twilight. And this was Sheila’s home. ”

“ Sheila said. “And you will find her far more beautiful and kind to you than anything you dreamed about; and you will try to write your best music to give to her. And then, if you should be unhappy, you will find how much worse is the real unhappiness about one you love than the sentiment of a song you can lay aside at any moment.”
The lad looked at her. “What can you know about unhappiness, madame?” he said, with a frank and gentle simplicity that she liked.
“I,” said Sheila. “When people get married and begin to experience the cares of the world, they must expect to be unhappy sometimes.” ”

“ Down at their feet, near the shore, a dusky line of huts and houses was scarcely visible, and over these lay a pale blue film of peat-smoke that did not move in the still air. Then they saw the bay into which the White Water runs, and they could trace the yellow glimmer of the river stretching into the island through a level valley of bog and morass. Far away, toward the East, lay the bulk of the island—dark green undulations of moorland and pasture; and there, in the darkness, the gable of one white house had caught the clear light of the sky, and was gleaming Westward like a star. ”

“ Men marry women—there is no difficulty about that—and you can generally get an amiable sort of person to become your wife and have a sort of affection for you, and so on. But how many have bestowed on them the pure and exalted passion of a young and innocent girl, who is ready to worship with all the fervor of a warmly imaginative and emotional nature the man she has chosen to love? And suppose he is young, too, and capable of understanding all the tender sentiments of a high-spirited, sensitive and loyal woman, and suppose that he fancies himself as much in love with her as she with him? ”

“ To put a little barbaric splendor of decoration into the little smoking-room, to have a scent of peat-smoke in the air, and to have a timid, sweet-voiced, pretty Highland girl suddenly make her appearance, with an odor of the sea about her, as it were, and a look of fresh breezes in the color of her cheeks—what mortal man could find fault with this innocent jest? Sheila’s moments of doubt were succeeded by long hours of joyous confidence, in which a happy light shone on her face. ”

“ To live forever in this magic land—to have the princess herself carry him in this little boat into the quiet bays of the islands, or out at night, in the moonlight, on the open sea—to forget forever the godless South and its social phantasmagoria, and live in this beautiful and distant solitude, with the solemn secrets of the hills and the moving deep forever present to the imagination, might not that be a nobler life? ”

“ Some day, no doubt, you will love a woman for what she is, not for what you fancy her to be; but that is a piece of good fortune that seldom occurs to a youth of your age. To marry in a dream, and wake up six months afterwards—that is the fate of ingenuous twenty-three. But don’t you let Mackenzie hear you talk of marrying Sheila, or he’ll have some of his fishermen throw you into Loch Roag.”
“There, now, that is one point I can’t understand about her,” said Lavender, eagerly. ”

“ He ought to leave Brighton at once, and London, too. He ought to go away into the country or by the seaside, and begin working hard to earn money and self-respect at the same time; and then, in his friendly solitude, he would get to know something about Sheila’s character, and begin to perceive how much more valuable were these genuine qualities of heart and mind than any social graces such as might lighten up a dull drawing-room. Had Lavender yet learnt to know the worth of an honest woman’s perfect love and unquestioning devotion? ”

“ There was a beautiful clear twilight abroad, the darkness still of a soft gray, and up in the pale yellow-green of the sky a large planet burned and throbbed. Soon the sea and the sky would darken, the stars would come forth in thousands and tens of thousands, and the moving water would be struck with a million trembling spots of silver as the waves came onward to the beach.
“Mayn’t we go out for a walk till Frank has finished his cigar?” said Sheila.
“You couldn’t go out walking at this time of night,” said Mrs. Kavanagh, in a kindly way, “you would meet the most unpleasant persons. ”

“ Kavanagh’s daughter.
“We call her Princess Sheila,” said Lavender. “What do you think of the name?”
“You couldn’t have got a better,” Ingram said, sententiously, and interposing as if it was not within his wife’s province to form an opinion of any sort. “And where is your father, Sheila? In Borva?”
“Oh, no, he is here,” the girl said, with a smile. “But the truth is, he has driven away to see some gentlemen he knows, to ask if he can have some grouse for you. He should have been back by this time.” ”

“ But when he got into the hired brougham, and thought of the people he was about to meet, and of the manner in which they would carry away such and such impressions of the girl, he lost faith in that admiration. He would much rather have had Sheila unnoticeable and unnoticed—one who would quietly take her place at the dinner-table, and attract no more special attention than the flowers, for example, which every one would glance at with some satisfaction, and then forget in the interest of talking and dining. He was quite conscious of his own weakness in thus fearing social criticism. ”

“ EARLY morning at Borva, fresh, luminous and rare; the mountains in the South grown pale and cloud-like under a sapphire sky; the sea ruffled into a darker blue by a light breeze from the west; and the sunlight lying hot on the red gravel and white shells around Mackenzie’s house. There is an odor of sweetbrier about, hovering in the warm, still air, except at such times as the breeze freshens a bit, and brings around the shoulder of the hill the cold, strange scent of the rocks and the sea beyond. ”

“ In a rude little sheiling, built on one of the plateaus of rock, Frank Lavender sat alone, listening to the plashing of the rain without. A rifle that he had just carefully dried lay across his knees. A brace of deer-hounds had stretched out their paws on the earthen floor, and had put their long noses between their paws to produce a little warmth. It was, indeed, a cold and damp morning, and the little hut was pervaded with a smell of wet wood and also of peat ashes, for one of the gillies had tried to light a fire, but the peats had gone out. ”

“ When she got inside the servant who had opened the door bobbed a curtsey to her; should she shake hands with her and say, “And are you ferry well?” But at this moment Lavender came running up the steps, playfully hurried her into the house and up the stairs, and led her into her own drawing-room. “Well, darling, what do you think of your home, now that you see it?”
Sheila looked around timidly. It was not a big room, but it was a palace in height and grandeur and color compared with that little museum in Borva in which Sheila’s piano stood. ”

“ Whatever you do don’t marry a fool, or all your philosophers won’t make the house bearable to you.”
“I am not likely to marry anybody, Mrs. Lavender,” said Ingram, carelessly.
“Is there no woman you know whom you would care to marry?”
“Oh,” he said, “there is one woman—yes—who seems to me about everything a man could wish, but the notion of my marrying her is absurd. If I had known in time, don’t you see, that I should ever think of such a thing, I should have begun years ago to dye my hair. I can’t begin now. Gray hair inspires reverence, I believe, but it is a bad thing to go courting with.” ”

“ Nor was this matter of the sketches the only thing that had particularly recommended Lavender to the old man. Mackenzie had a most distinct dislike to Gaelic songs. He could not bear the monotonous melancholy of them. When Sheila, sitting by herself, would sing these strange old ballads of an evening, he would suddenly enter the room, probably find her eyes filled with tears, and then he would in his inmost heart devote the whole of Gaelic minstrelsy and all its authors to the infernal gods. Why should people be forever maddening themselves with the stories of other folks’ misfortunes? ”

“ There is an abundance of fishing-craft in the harbor, lying in careless and picturesque groups, with their brown hulls and spars sending a ruddy reflection down on the lapping water, which is green under the shadow of each boat. Along the shores stand the tall poles on which the fishermen dry their nets, and above these, on the summit of a rocky crag, rise the ruins of an old castle, with the daylight shining through the empty windows. ”

“ Ingram, mamma,” said Cecilia—as if any one had had the courage to disagree with Mr. Ingram!—“rich people are shamefully ill-treated. If you go to a theatre now you find that all the virtues are on the side of the poor, and if there are a few vices, you get a thousand excuses for them. No one takes account of the temptations of the rich. You have people educated from their infancy to imagine that the whole world was made for them, every wish they have gratified, every day showing them people dependent on them and grateful for favors ”

“ The travelers sat down on a low rock of gneiss to rest themselves, and then and there did the King of Borva recite his grievances and rage against the English smacks. Was it not enough that they should in passing steal the sheep, but that they should also, in mere wantonness, stalk them as deer, wounding them with rifle bullets, and leaving them to die among the rocks. Sheila said bravely that no one could tell that it was the English fishermen who did that. Why not the crews of merchant vessels, who might be of any nation? ”

“ It is really too bad of you, Sheila, to be so forgetful; what if Lady Leveret, for example, had come into that shop? It seems to me you are never satisfied with meeting the people you ought to meet, but that you must go and associate with all the wretched cripples and beggars you can find. You should remember you are a woman, and not a child—that people will talk about what you do if you go on in this mad way. Do you ever see Mrs. Kavanagh or her daughter do any of these things? ”

“ They have no rain and no fog; almost always blue skies, and the clouds high up and far away. And the beautiful trees they have, too! you never saw anything like that in the Lewis, not even at Stornoway. And the people are so rich and beautiful in their dress, and all the day they have only to think how to enjoy themselves and what new amusements is for the morrow. But I think they are tired of having nothing to do; or, perhaps, you know, they are tired because they have nothing to fight against—no hard weather and hunger and poverty. ”