Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 704

'No; she iss not,' said Angus.

'No?'

'No! She iss yours, Maggie! I built her for ye – every inch of her grew under my own hand – and she's no a pad poat at all, though it iss me that says it – '

'Well, Angus – '

'Don't say another word, but go aboard,' said Angus, proceeding down the steep slippery steps to the loch, leading Maggie gallantly by the hand. Speedily the rope was unloosed, the white sail spread to the breeze, and the boat moved gracefully and rapidly, under a glorious sunset sky, out into the loch. Maggie sat holding the tiller silently while Angus adjusted the ropes. The loch was radiant from shore to shore in the rich evening light; quickly the white houses of the town were left in the distance; and hardly a movement but the delicious ripple of water cleft by the boat's bow, or the cry of a sea-gull sailing lazily overhead, disturbed the stillness. Here and there in the pools among the boulders in lonely parts of the shore, a heron stood silent as its own shadow and solitary as a hermit; from the grassy hollows by the beach a thin white mist rose, softening the green wooded slopes, and adding a sense of distance to the heathery ridges in the background, glorified by the red autumn sunset. Maggie was supremely happy. When the sail was fairly set, Angus came and stretched himself by her side.

'And ye think she iss a nice poat, and ye like her?' he said, looking into Maggie's face.

'It wass fery kind of ye to think of giving me such a present as this, Angus; but I cannot possibly take it.'

'Maggie,' said Angus, taking her disengaged hand in his, 'I hef long wanted to tell you something – indeed I hef, Maggie – not that I'm a goot hand at telling anything I want, but – all the time I wass building her, and that wass longer than ye might think, Maggie – I hef looked to this moment as a reward – when I would see you sitting there, looking that happy and that peautiful – yes, Maggie, peautiful, and pleased with my work – and proud am I to see ye so pleased wi' a trifle' —

'But it iss not a trifle,' said the maiden interrupting him; 'it wass a great undertaking! I nefer saw anything I liked half so much.'

'But it iss nothing, I tell you, Maggie, to what I would gif you if you would be willing to take it – nothing! I would like you, Maggie, to take all I hef – and myself too. It iss true I am only a common sailor, but Maggie, my heart iss fery warm to you. Many's the time, when I wass a hundred and maybe thousants of miles away from here, I wad pe thinking of you – many a time in the middle of the night, when I wass on the deck alone, watching and looking at the stars under a foreign sky, I would single out a particular star and call it Maggie's eye, and watch it lovingly, cass I thocht you might pe looking at it too, even if you wass not thinking of me thousants of miles off; and it makes me fery unhappy when I'm a long way off, to think that maybe I am forgotten, and some other man iss trying to get your love, and maybe I losing my chance of happiness for life, cass, like a fool, I held my peace, when by speaking a word my happiness and yours might pe secure.'

Angus's arm had stolen round the girl's waist as he proceeded in the speech that was a direct outflow from his heart. She did not try to speak for a little. Angus saw that her eyes were filled with tears.

'It wass wrong of ye, Angus, efer to think I would forget ye,' she said.

'Then ye do think sometimes apoot me when I am not near you?'

'Angus, how can you pe speaking nonsense like that!'

'But it iss not nonsense to me, Maggie,' said her lover seriously; 'I love you, Maggie, as I love no woman in the world; and Maggie, if you were to – to – it wad break my' —

It was the old story. Two human souls meeting under the light of heaven, each recognising in the other that which each yearned for, to give completeness to life; the spoken word being the outward force impelling them towards each other, as two dewdrops merge into one by a movement external to both. The Highland girl had no desire to break her lover's heart; nay, she was ready to give her own in exchange for his love with all the impulsiveness of a simple and true nature. As the boat sped on they noted not that twilight was deepening into evening, that the stars were myriad-eyed above them, and the crescent moon glimmered over the hills and shone in quivering tracks along the loch. So it came about that at the same moment of time when the piper in the clachan was apostrophising Angus's father in the words already recorded – 'Nae doot your son Angus will pe wanting me to learn him to play the pipes too; and nae doot, when he comes for that purpose, he will look to have his crack wi' Maggie,' &c. – his daughter's arms were being thrown impulsively about Angus's neck, and Angus himself was the happiest man in the Western Highlands.

Maggie reached Glen Heath with a joyous heart. She was there before the piper. She speedily girt on her apron, and with tucked-up sleeves proceeded to the more prosaic duty of baking 'scones' that might be warm and palatable for the piper's supper; and as she rolled out the dough, and patted and rolled and kneaded it, and turned it before the fire until an appetising browniness covered each surface, she sang merrily one of the merriest of the sad Gaelic melodies.

But the piper was late. The white cloth was spread, and the scones had time to cool, before Diana leaping to her feet, stretched herself, yawned, and went to the door sniffing. Maggie opened the door immediately; the piper swung along the path unsteadily. The dog went to meet him without enthusiasm, half-doubtful of her reception, and only narrowly escaped the kick which the piper aimed at her.

'Get out, ye prute!' he said, as he came in; and when the animal still came fawning towards him, he hurled his bagpipes with great force at her head, only with the result, however, of breaking the pipe's mouthpiece. 'O the prute!' he cried when he saw what had happened; 'she has proken my favourite shanter – the shanter that I've played wi' for fifteen years. O the prute! I'll cut her throat, to teach her to keep oot o' my way. My best shanter too!'

'Come, dad, you are late,' said Maggie cheerily, going to meet him; 'you hef had a long walk. I hef boiled some eggs for ye, and baked some scones; come, hef some supper before ye go to bed.'

'Ay, ay, ye are a praw lass, Maggie, one o' the right sort,' the piper said. 'But to think my poor shanter's broken. I will nefer see her like again whatefer!'

The piper sat down to supper with an enormous appetite, and Maggie waited upon him devotedly, uncertain whether she should reveal her secret or not in the present dubious state of her father's temper.

'Anypody peen here for me the day?' he asked between mouthfuls.

'Yes, Angus MacTavish wass here in the afternoon; and he' —

The piper laid down his knife, looked straight in his daughter's face with a fierceness that startled her, saying: 'Hang Angus MacTavish and efery man i' their black clan! A MacTavish nefer darkens my threshold again! If Angus MacTavish efer comes to my house he will live to rue it. I hate efery living MacTavish!'

Maggie looked in her father's face amazed. To violent language she was well accustomed; but sober or otherwise, she had never heard him utter a word against the MacTavishes until now.

'Come, dad,' she said after a short silence, during which time she decided it would be better to say nothing of what was uppermost in her mind until morning – 'come, dad; something has vexed you to-night. You will be petter in the morning. Angus iss the best friend either you or I hef in the wide world.'

'I tell you,' burst out the piper, 'I will not hef his name mentioned in my hoose, not by you or any other! And if you go apoot with him, Meg, as I hef seen ye do lately, I'll – I'll maybe pack you out of doors too!'

The tears were in poor Maggie's eyes, but she comforted herself as she put up the bolt in the door for the night, by assuring herself, as she heard the piper stumbling up-stairs to his room: 'Poor dad, he iss worse than usual to-night.' And when she slept, she dreamed of Angus.

CHAPTER III

The piper's anger seemed to be modified on the following morning; but he still growled when his daughter introduced the name MacTavish as he sat before a steaming bowl of porridge and a basin of milk, which he attacked with a large horn spoon and an appetite comparable only to the giant's who fell a victim to the adroitness of Jack the celebrated Giant-killer. Maggie's enthusiastic account of Angus's gift of the boat was received with a critical coldness that made her heart sink within her.

'O ay, Maggie; it iss no doot a peautiful poat – she wass sure to pe that if Angus built her; but it iss fery easy to see what Angus MacTavish iss driving at. Maybe he'll find he has peen counting without his host mirofer, if he thinks he iss going to get you for his wife by gifing you a fishing-poat; what wass a fishing-poat to a lass like you? – as if ye wass a poor lass! Ye're no to pe fashing your head apoot Angus MacTavish, lass – no; he iss no doot a cood lad, but no for the like o' you! There iss Sandy Buchanan noo, the lawyer's clerk mirofer, a far more likely lad to make ye a cood man, and willing?'

'O dad, and how can ye pe saying such things to me on the happiest day o' my life, for Angus asked me yesterday to be his wife; and I – I' —

'Ye what?' said the piper, laying down his spoon and eyeing his daughter sternly.

'Weel, dad, I – I – didna say No.'

'Then I'm thinking ye'll hef to go this fery day whatefer and say "No," my lass, for I'm telling ye I won't hef it!'

Maggie was not generally one of the tearful sort, but the sudden emphasis of her father's words filled her eyes with tears and drove her to silence. She did not trust herself to speak, but lifted her pail hurriedly with a flushed face, and went sorrowfully to milk the 'kye,' whose deep impatient lowing from the byre was urgently demanding attention. When she was half across the court-yard she heard her father calling her back. She turned and went to him.

'Maggie,' he said, drawing her to his knee and holding her brown face between his rough hands tenderly, 'it iss not crying ye are, my bonny lass? No; I wad not hef my lass crying for any MacTavish that efer drank a dram! Not that Angus iss a pad lad – no, I will not say he iss that – he plays the pipes petter than any lad of his years I efer saw – but the MacTavishes – Ah weel, they're no jist the clan that the Camerons should marry into. Noo, dry your eyes, lass, and pe off to your milking mirofer – Crumple iss moaning as if her udder wass going to crack.'

The maiden said, nothing; she kissed him, but the smile was all vanished from her face as she stooped to relieve Crumple of her milky burden.

The piper went to the stable, and the sound of his whistling rang over the place as he brushed down his horses and gave them their morning feed.

Maggie was in strong hopes, as the morning advanced, that before nightfall, when she expected Angus to come, the tempest would be over, and Angus hailed by her father in his old manner. This hope was dispelled, and poor Maggie made miserable beyond bearing when her father returned to his mid-day meal. The piper had early in the forenoon taken his fishing-rod and gone to a favourite spot of his known as 'the Black Hole,' on the stream, where he had wiled away many an hour and tempted to the bank many a fat spotted trout. When he returned to dinner, his daughter saw with surprise that he brought no fish with him, and that his fishing-rod was broken into half-a-dozen pieces; and moreover, that he was white with anger. Fingal his collie was following with dejected tail and a torn ear, apparently in as bad a temper as his master, judging from the snarling greeting he gave Diana who went to meet them.

'Py the powers, but I'll put the law on him; I'll hef him put in the jail,' cried the piper, as he went into his kitchen and tossed the fragments of his fishing-rod into a corner. 'The plaguard, to preak my fishing-rod and steal my fish mirofer; but I'll hef the law on him! He shall go pefore the shirra as sure as my name iss John Cameron!'

Maggie did not know that Mr MacTavish was at the same moment on his way home with a swollen black eye, carrying with him a goodly fish that ought to have been in the piper's basket, 'Jet' limping behind his master very much bruised indeed.

'And it iss the Teuk that wull pe told all apoot it; the prood teffle, poaching the salmon like a common thief, and knocking a man apoot as if he wass a lower animal,' said the game-keeper, recording his grievance indignantly to his buxom wife, in answer to sympathetic ejaculations as to the state of his eye, when he returned to his dinner.

True to his word, the piper sent the herd-boy to the lawyer's office to tell Sandy Buchanan, with the piper's compliments, &c., that Mr Cameron desired to see him at Glen Heath on important business.

'Well, dad,' Maggie had said impetuously when she heard this message given to 'Geordy,' as they sat at dinner, hardly understanding from what motive her father sought the presence of the detested Sandy Buchanan, 'I can only say that I shall not bide in the hoose if that red-headed, ill-looking man comes to the hoose; I won't inteed!'

'Ye are red-headed yourself!' said the piper abruptly.

'No; I'm not.'

'Yes, ye are. The man canna help himself if the Almichty gef him a red head. The best o' folks iss red-headed. I'm red-headed; and ye are red as a fox or a squirrel yourself, I tell ye' —

'Well, well, dad, we'll no quarrel apoot that; maybe I am; but' —