White Heather: A Novel (Volume 1 of 3)

The blossom was white on the blackthorn tree,
And the mavis was singing rarely;
When Meenie, Love Meenie, walked out wi' me,
All in the springtime early.

'Meenie, Love Meenie, your face let me see,
Meenie, come answer me fairly;
Meenie, Love Meenie, will you wed me,
All in the springtime early?'

Meenie but laughed; and kentna the pain
That shot through my heart fu' sairly:
'Kind sir, it's a maid that I would remain,
All in the springtime early.'

And 'Hey, Harry, lad,' he was saying, as he entered the cottage and went into the little parlour, where a candle had been left burning, 'we'll have our supper together now; for between you and me I'm just as hungry as a gled.'

CHAPTER V

BEGINNINGS

Next day promised to give them sharper work on the loch. The weather had changed towards the morning; showers of hail had fallen; and now all the hills around – Ben Hee and Ben Hope and Ben Loyal – had their far peaks and shoulders powdered over, while the higher slopes and summit of the giant Clebrig were one solid mass of white. It was much colder, too; and the gusts of wind that came hurling along Strath Terry[#] struck down on the loch, spreading out like black fans, and driving the darkened water into curling crisp foam. It was a wild, changeable, blowy morning; sunlight and gloom intermingled; and ever the wind howled and moaned around the house, and the leafless trees outside bent and shivered before the wintry blast.

[#] No doubt corrupted from Strath Tairibh, the Strath of the Bull.

When the tall Highland lass brought in breakfast it appeared that the recusant gillie had not yet come down from Tongue; but it was no matter, she said; she would call Ronald. Now this exactly suited Mr. Hodson, who wanted to have some further speech with the young man – in view of certain far-reaching designs he had formed; and what better opportunity for talk than the placid trolling for salmon on the lake there? But courtesy demanded some small protest.

'I am afraid I cannot ask him a second day,' he remarked.

'Oh,' said she (for she did not wish the gentleman to imagine that she thought over much of the smart young keeper), 'he ought to be ferry glad if he can be of use to any one. He is jist amusing himself with the other lads.'

Which was strictly true at this moment. On the little plateau outside Ronald's cottage two or three of them were standing together. They had got a heavy iron ball, to which was attached about a yard and a half of rope, and one after another was trying who could launch this ball the farthest, after swinging it three or four times round his head. It came to Ronald's turn. He was not the most thick-set of those young fellows; but he was wiry and muscular. He caught the rope with both hands, swung the heavy weight round his head some four or five times – his teeth getting ever and ever more firmly clenched the while – and then away went the iron ball through the air, not only far outstripping all previous efforts, but unluckily landing in a wheelbarrow and smashing sadly a jacket which one of the lads had thrown there when he entered upon this competition. When he somewhat ruefully took up the rent garment, there was much ironical laughing; perhaps that was the reason that none of them heard Nelly calling.

'Ronald!'

The tall, slim Highland maid was pretty angry by this time. She had come out of the house without any head-gear on; and the cold wind was blowing her yellow hair about her eyes; and she was indignant that she had to walk so far before attracting the attention of those idle lads.

'Ronald, do you hear!' she called; and she would not move another yard towards them.

And then he happened to notice her.

'Well, lass, what is't ye want?'

'Come away at once!' she called, in not the most friendly way. 'The gentleman wants you to go down to the loch.'

But he was the most good-natured of all these young fellows; the lasses about ordered him this way or that just as they pleased.

'What!' he called to her, 'hasna Fraser come down from Tongue yet?'

'No, he has not.'

'Bless us; the whisky must have been strong,' said he, as he picked up his jacket. 'I'll be there in a minute, Nelly.'

And so it was that when Mr. Hodson went into the little front hall, he found everything in trim readiness for getting down to the loch – the proper minnows selected; traces tried; luncheon packed; and his heavy waterproof coat slung over Ronald's arm.

'Seems you think I can't carry my own coat?' Mr. Hodson said; for he did not like to see this man do anything in the shape of servant work; whereas Ronald performed these little offices quite naturally and as a matter of course.

'I'll take it, sir,' said he; 'and if you're ready now we'll be off. Come along, Duncan.'

And he was striding away with his long deerstalker step, when Mr. Hodson stopped him.

'Wait a bit, man; I will walk down to the loch with you.'

So Duncan went on, and the American and Ronald followed.

'Sharp this morning.'

'Rayther sharp.'

'But this must be a very healthy life of yours – out in the fresh air always – plenty of exercise – and so forth.'

'Just the healthiest possible, sir.'

'But monotonous a little?'

''Deed no, sir. A keeper need never be idle if he minds his business; there's always something new on hand.'

'Then we'll say it is a very enjoyable life, so long as your health lasts, and you are fit for the work?'

This was apparently a question.

'Well, sir, the head stalker on the Rothie-Mount forest is seventy-two years of age; and there is not one of the young lads smarter on the hill than he is.'

'An exception, doubtless. The betting is all against your matching that record. Well, take your own case: what have you to look forward to as the result of all your years of labour? I agree with you that in the meantime it is all very fine; I can understand the fascination of it, even, and the interest you have in becoming acquainted with the habits of the various creatures, and so forth. Oh yes, I admit that – the healthiness of the life, and the interest of it; and I daresay you get more enjoyment out of the shooting and stalking than Lord Ailine, who pays such a preposterous price for it. But say we give you a fairly long lease of health and strength sufficient for the work: we'll take you at sixty; what then? Something happens – rheumatism, a broken leg, anything – that cripples you. You are superseded; you are out of the running; what is to become of you?'

'Well, sir,' said Ronald instantly, 'I'm thinking his lordship wouldna think twice about giving a pension to a man that had worked for him as long as that.'

It was a luckless answer. For Mr. Hodson, whose first article of belief was that all men are born equal, had come to Europe with a positive resentment against the very existence of lords, and a detestation of any social system that awarded them position and prestige merely on account of the accident of their birth. And what did he find now? Here was a young fellow of strong natural character, of marked ability, and fairly independent spirit, so corrupted by this pernicious system that he looked forward quite naturally to being helped in his old age by his lordship – by one of those creatures who still wore the tags and rags of an obsolete feudalism, and were supposed to 'protect' their vassals. The House of Peers had a pretty bad time of it during the next few minutes; if the tall, sallow-faced, gray-eyed man talked with little vehemence, his slow, staccato sentences had a good deal of keen irony in them. Ronald listened respectfully. And perhaps the lecture was all the more severe that the lecturer had but little opportunity of delivering it in his own domestic circle. Truly it was hard that his pet grievance won for him nothing but a sarcastic sympathy there; and that it was his own daughter who flouted him with jibes and jeers.

'Why, you know, pappa dear,' she would say as she stood at the window of their hotel in Piccadilly, and watched the carriages passing to and fro beneath her, 'lords may be bad enough, but you know they're not half as bad as the mosquitoes are at home. They don't worry one half as much; seems to me you might live in this country a considerable time and never be worried by one of them. Why, that's the worst of it. When I left home, I thought the earls and marquises would just be crowding us; and they don't seem to come along at all. I confess they are a mean lot. Don't they know well enough that the first thing ['the fooist thing,' she said, of course; but her accent sounded quite quaint and pretty if you happened to be looking at the pretty, soft, opaque, dark eyes] the first thing an American girl has to do when she gets to Europe is to have a lord propose to her, and to reject him? But how can I? They won't come along! It's just too horrid for anything; for of course when I go back home they'll say – "It's because you're not a Boston girl. London's full of lords; but it's only Boston girls they run after; and, poor things, they and their coronets are always being rejected. The noble pride of a Republican country; wave the banner!"'

But here Mr. Hodson met with no such ill-timed and flippant opposition. Ronald the keeper listened respectfully, and only spoke when spoken to; perhaps the abstract question did not interest him. But when it came to the downright inquiry as to whether he, Strang, considered his master, Lord Ailine, to be in any way whatever a better man than himself, his answer was prompt.

'Yes, sir, he is,' he said, as they walked leisurely along the road. 'He is a better man than me by two inches round the chest, as I should guess. Why, sir, the time that I hurt my kneecap, one night we were coming down Ben Strua, our two selves, nothing would hinder his lordship but he must carry me on his back all the way down the hill and across the burn till we reached the shepherd's bothy. Ay, and the burn in spate; and the night as dark as pitch; one wrong step on the swing-bridge, and both of us were gone. There's Peter McEachran at Tongue, that some of them think's the strongest man in these parts; and I offered to bet him five shillings he wouldna carry me across that bridge – let alone down the hill – on a dark night. But would he try? Not a bit, sir.'

'I should think Peter Mac – what's his name? – was a wiser man than to risk his neck for five shillings,' Mr. Hodson said drily. 'And you – you would risk yours – for what?'

'Oh, they were saying things about his lordship,' Ronald said carelessly.

'Then he is not worshipped as a divinity by everybody?' the American said shrewdly.