The Cruise of the Snowbird: A Story of Arctic Adventure

“And I know right well,” said Rory, “what you’re thinking about.”

“Perhaps you do,” Ralph replied.

“Ay, that I do,” said Rory; “but don’t be an old wife, Ralph – never evince undue curiosity, never exhibit impatience. In other words, don’t be a squaw.”

“Oho!” cried Ralph, “now I see where the land lies. ‘Don’t be a squaw,’ eh? You’ve been reading Fenimore Cooper, you old rogue, you! The centre of a great forest in the Far West of America – midnight – a council of war – chiefs squatting around the camp fire – smoking the calumet – enter Eagle-eye – scats himself in silence – everybody burning to hear what he has to say, but no one dares ask for the world – ugh! and all that sort of thing. Am I right, Rory?”

“Indeed you are,” said the other, laughing; “you’ve bowled me out, I confess. But, after all, you know, it will be just as well not to seem impatient, and so I move that we never speak a word to McBain about what he said last night until he is pleased to open the conversation.”

“Right,” said Ralph; “and now let us go down to breakfast.”

Both Mrs McGregor and Allan’s sister Helen were very different from what Ralph and Rory had expected to find them. They had taken their notions of Highland ladies from the novels of Walter Scott and other literary worthies. Before they had come to Glentroom they had pictured to themselves Mrs McGregor as a kind of Spartan mother – tall, stately, dark, and proud, with a most exalted idea of her own importance, with an inexorable hatred of all the Saxon race, and an inordinate love of spinning. Her daughter, they had thought, must also be tall, and, if beautiful, of a kind of majestic and stately beauty, repellent more than attractive, and one more to be feared than loved. And they felt sure that Mrs McGregor would be almost constantly bending over her spinning-wheel, while Helen, if ever she condescended to bend over anything, which they had deemed a matter of doubt, would be bending over a very ancient piece of goods in the shape of a harp.

These were their imaginings prior to their arrival at the castle, but these ideas were all wrong, and very delighted were the young men to find them so. Here in Mrs McGregor was no stiff fastidious lady; she was a very woman and a very mother, loving her children tenderly, and devoted to their interests, and rejoiced to hold out the hand of welcome to her children’s friends. On the sunny side of fifty, she was slightly inclined to embonpoint, extremely pleasant both in voice and manner as well as in face. Rory first, and Ralph soon afterwards, felt as much at home in her presence and company as if they had known her all their lives.

As to Helen Edith, I do not think that any one would have been able to guess her nationality had they met her in society in town. She had been educated principally abroad, and could speak both the Italian and French languages, not only fluently, but, if I may be allowed the expression, mellifluently, for she possessed perfection of accent as well as exceeding sweetness of voice. She was rather small in stature, with pretty and shapely hands, and a nice figure.

Was she beautiful? you may ask me. Well, had you asked her brother he would have said, “Indeed, I never gave the matter a thought,” but Rory and Ralph would have told you that she was beautiful, and they would have added the words, “and sisterly.” I do not know whether or not Helen was a better or a worse musician than most young girls of her age – she was just turned seventeen. She sang sweetly, though not loudly; she never screamed, but sang with expression, as if she felt what she sang; and she accompanied herself on the harp. But as for Mrs McGregor’s spinning-wheel, why, our young heroes cast their eyes about in vain for it.

The portion of the castle now occupied by the McGregors was furnished in a far more luxurious style than probably accorded with their fallen fortunes, but everywhere there was evidence of refinement of taste. The old hall and the picture gallery delighted Rory most; he could fit a romance into every rusty coat of mail, and fix a poem to every spear and helmet.

“What a grand thing,” he said to Allan, “it is to have had ancestors! Never one had I, that I know of – leastways, none of them ever troubled themselves to sit for their portraits. More by token, perhaps, they couldn’t afford it.”

If Ralph enjoyed himself at the castle – and I might say that he undoubtedly did – he did not say a very great deal about it. To give vocal expression to his pleasure was not much in Ralph’s line, but it was in Rory’s, who, by the way, although nearly as old as his companion, was far more of a boy.

The feelings of the young chief of the McGregors, while showing his friends over the old castle, the ancient home of his fathers, were those of sadness, mingled with a very little touch of pride. Every room had its story, every chamber its tale – often one of sorrow; and these were listened to by Ralph and Rory with rapt attention, although every now and then some curious or quaint remark from the lips of the latter would set the other two laughing, and often materially damage some relation of events that bordered closely on the romantic.

“If ever I’m rich enough,” said Allan, leading the way into the ancient banqueting-hall, “I mean to re-roof and re-furnish the whole of the older portion of the castle.”

“But wherever has the roof gone to?” asked Rory, looking upwards at the sky above them.

“Fire would explain that,” replied Allan; “the whole of this wing of the building was burned by Cumberland in ’45 – he who was surnamed the Bloody Duke, you know.”

“Were your people ‘out,’ as you call it, in ’45?” asked Ralph.

Allan nodded, and bit his lips; the memory of that terrible time was not a pleasant one to this Highland chief.

The little turret chambers were a source of both interest and curiosity to Allan’s companions.

“Bedrooms and watch-towers, are they?” said Ralph, viewing them critically. “Well, you catch a beautiful glimpse of the glen, and the hills, and woods, and lake from that little narrow window, with its solitary iron stanchion; but I say, Allan – bedrooms, eh? Aren’t you joking, old man? Fancy a great tall lanky fellow like me in a bedroom this size; why, I’d have to double up like a jack-knife!”

“Oh! look, Ralph, at these dark, mysterious stains on the oaken floor,” cried Rory – “blood, of course? Do you know, Allan, my boy, what particular deed of darkness was committed in this turret chamber?”

“I do, precisely,” replied Allan.

“Och! tell us, then – tell us!” said Rory.

“Ay, do,” said Ralph. “I shall lean against the window here and look out, for the view is delightful, but I’ll be listening all the same.”

“Well, then,” said Allan, “I made this little room my study for a few months last summer, and I spilt some ink there.”

“Now, indeed, indeed,” cried romantic Rory, “that is a shame to put us off like that. Never mind, Ralph; we know it is a blood-stain, and if Allan won’t tell us the story, then, we’ll invent one. Sure, now,” he continued, “I’d like to sleep here.”

“You’d catch your death of cold from the damp,” said Allan.

Rory wheeled him right round to the light, and gazed at him funnily from top to toe, and from toe to top.

“You’re a greater curiosity than the fine old castle itself,” said Rory; “and I don’t believe there is an ounce of romance in the whole big body of you. Now, if the place was mine, there isn’t a room – why, what is that?”

“That’s the gong,” said Allan, “and it says plainly enough, ‘Get r-r-r-r-ready for dinner.’”

“Well, but,” persisted Rory, “just before we go down below show us the corridor where the ghost walks at midnight, and the door through which it disappears.”

“A ghost!” said Allan; “indeed, I never knew there was one.”

“Ah! but,” Rory continued, “you never knew there wasn’t. Well, then, say probably there is a ghost, because you know, old fellow, in an ancient family like yours there must be a ghost. There must be some old fogey or another who didn’t think he was very well done by in this world, and feels bound to come back and walk about at midnight, and all that sort of thing. Pray, Allan, don’t break the spell. You’re welcome to the stains if you please, but ’deed and indeed, I mean to stick to the ghost.”

The first few days of their stay in Glentroom were spent in what Allan called “doing nothing,” for unless he left the castle for the hill, the river, or the lake, he did not consider he was doing anything. Within the castle walls, however, Rory for one was not idle. There was, in his opinion, a deal to be seen and a deal to be done: he had to make acquaintance with every living thing about the place – ponies and dogs, cattle and pigs, ducks, geese, fowl, and pigeons.

Old Janet averred that she had never seen such a boy in all her born days – that he turned the castle upside down, and kept all the “beasties” in an uproar; but at the same time she added that he was the prettiest boy ever she’d seen, and “Heaven bless his bonnie face,” which put her in mind of her dear dead boy Donald, and she couldn’t be angry with him, for even when he was doing mischief he made her laugh.

The parish in which Glentroom lies is a very wide one indeed, and contained at the time our tale opens many families of distinction. Nearly all of these were on visiting terms with the McGregors, and many a beautifully-fitted sledge used to drive over the drawbridge of Arrandoon Castle during the winter months – wheels, of course, were out of the question when the snow lay thick on the ground – so that life in Allan’s family, although it did not partake of the gaiety of the London season, was by no means a dull one, and both Ralph and Rory thought the evenings spent in the drawing-room were very enjoyable indeed. Ralph was a good conversationalist and a good listener: he delighted in hearing music, while Rory delighted to play, and, for his years, he was a violinist of no mean order. He had never been known to go anywhere – not even on the shortest of holiday tours – without the long black case that contained his pet instrument.

Now, as none of “the resident gentry,” as they were called, who visited at the castle have anything at all to do with our story, I shall not fatigue my readers by introducing them.

And why, it may be asked, should I trouble myself about describing life at the castle at all? And where is the Snowbird? – for doubtless you have guessed already that it is a ship of some kind. The Snowbird ere very long will sail majestically up that Highland lake before you, and in her, along with our heroes, you and I, reader, will embark, and together we will journey afar over the ocean wave, to regions hitherto but little known to man. Our adventures there will be many, wild, and varied, and some of them, too, so far from pleasant, that while exiled in the frozen seas of the far North, our thoughts will oftentimes turn fondly homewards, and we will think with a joy borrowed from the past of the quiet and peaceful days we spent in bonnie Arrandoon.

Ralph and Rory had kept the promise they had made to each other on the morning succeeding their arrival at Arrandoon; they left McBain to dream over his “idea” in peace. They did not behave like squaws, and I think it was the third or fourth evening before Allan’s foster-father said another word about it. They were then all around the fire, as they had been before; the ladies had retired, and the dogs were making themselves as snug and comfortable as dogs know how to whenever they get a chance.

“Well,” said McBain, after there had been a lull in the conversation for some little time, “we’ve been all so happy and jolly here for the last few days, that we haven’t had time to think much or to look ahead either; but now, if you don’t mind, young gentlemen, I will tell you what I should propose in the way of spending a few of the incoming spring and summer months, in what I should call a very pleasant fashion.”

“Yes,” cried Rory, “do tell us, we are burning to hear about it, and if it be anything new it is sure to be nice.”

“Very well,” said McBain. “Allan there tells me he means to stick to you both for a time – to keep you prisoners in Glentroom. He will trot you about for all that; you’ll be on parole, and roam about wherever you like; and you can fish and shoot and sketch just as much as ever you have a mind to. Meanwhile, buy a boat; I know where there is one to sell that will suit us in every way – a grand, big, strong, open boat. She belongs to Duncan Forbes, of Fort Augustus, and can be bought for an old song. We can have her round into the loch here. I’m a bit of a sailor, as Allan knows, and I’ll show you how to deck her over, set up rigging and mast, and make her complete, and I’ll make bold to say that before we have done with her she will be as neat and pretty a little craft as ever hauled the wind.”

“I say, boys,” said Rory, “I think the idea is a glorious one.”

“I must say, I like it immensely,” said Ralph.

“And so do I,” said Allan, “if – if we can all afford it.”

“Oh! but stop a little,” said McBain, “you haven’t heard all my proposal yet; the best of it is to come. Your cruising ground will be all up and down among the Western Islands, where the wildest and finest scenery in Europe exists. You’ll get any amount of fishing and shooting too, for wherever you three smart-looking young yachtsmen land on the coast, people will vie with each other in offering you Highland hospitality. And all the while you can make your pleasure pay you.”

“How – how – tell us how?”

“Why,” continued McBain, “around the rocky and rugged islands where you will be cruising are the finest lobsters in the world. You have only to sink a few cages every night when at anchor; you will draw them up full in the morning, and place them in a well in your hold. As soon as you have enough to make a paying voyage, round you will run to Greenock, where is always a ready market and good prices.”

Here Ralph jumped up and rubbed his hands; and Rory, forgetting his bruised shoulder and still bandaged head, hopped off the sofa to cry “Hurrah!” and this made Kooran bark, and of course Bran chimed in for company’s sake, and McBain wagged his beard and laughed with delight at the pleasure his suggestion seemed to afford the three young men; and, indeed, for the time being he felt quite as youthful as either of them.