Black William
A Princess of Thule
She gave a little scream and started up. Two drops of blood had fallen on Lavender’s white decks.
“No, I see you can’t,” he said. “Open this knife, and I will dig it out myself. Bless the girl! are you going to faint because I have scratched my finger?”
Lavender, however, had to be called in to help, and while the surgical operation was going forward Mrs. Ingram said, “You see we have got towns-folks’ hands as yet. I suppose they will get to be leather by and by. I am sure I don’t know how Mrs. Lavender can do those things about a boat with the tiny little hands she has.”
“Yes, Sheila has small hands, hasn’t she?” Lavender said, as he bound up his friend’s finger; “but then she makes up for that by the bigness of her heart.”
It was a pretty and kindly speech, and it pleased Mrs Ingram, though Sheila did not hear it. Then, when the doctoring was over, they all went below for breakfast, and an odor of fish and ham and eggs and coffee prevailed throughout the yacht.
“I have quite fallen in love with this manner of life,” Mrs. Ingram said. “But, tell me, is it always as pleasant as this? Do you always have those blue seas around you, and green shores? Are the sails always white in the sunlight?”
There was a dead silence.
“Well, I would not say,” Mackenzie observed seriously, as no one else would take up the question – I would not say it is always ferry good weather off this coast – oh no, I would not say that – for if there was no rain, what would the cattle do, and the streams? – they would not hef a pool left in them. Oh, yes, there is rain sometimes, but you cannot always be sailing about, and when there will be rain you will hef your things to attend to in-doors. And there is always plenty of good weather if you wass wanting to tek a trip around the islands or down to Oban – oh, yes, there is no fear of that; and it will be a ferry good coast whatever for the harbor, and there is always some place you can put into if it wass coming on rough, only you must know the coast and the lie of the islands and the rocks about the harbors. And you would learn it ferry soon. There is Sheila there; there is no one in the Lewis will know more of the channels in Loch Roag than she does – not one, I can say that; and when you go farther away, then you must tek some one with you who wass well acquainted with the coast. If you wass thinking of having a yacht, Mr. Ingram, there is one I hef heard of just now in Rothesay that is for sale, and she is a ferry good boat, but not so big as this one.”
“I think we’ll wait till my wife knows more about it, Mr. Mackenzie,” Ingram said. “Wait till she gets round Ardnamurchan, and has crossed the Munch, and has got the fine Atlantic swell as you run into Borvapost.”
“Edward, you frighten me,” his wife said: “I was beginning to give myself courage.”
“But it is mere nonsense,” cried Mackenzie, impatiently. “Kott pless me! there is no chance of your being ill in this fine weather; and if you had a boat of your own, you would ferry soon get accustomed to the weather – oh, ferry soon, indeed – and you would hef no more fear of the water than Sheila has.”
“Sheila has far too little fear of the water,” her husband said.
“Indeed, and that is true,” said her father; “and it is not right that a young lass should go about by herself in a boat.”
“But you know very well, papa, I never do that now.”
“Oh, you do not do it now,” grumbled Mackenzie. “No, you do not do it now. But some day you will forget when there is something to be done, and you will run a great danger, Sheila.”
“But she has promised never to go out by herself, haven’t you, Sheila?” her husband said.
“I did; I promised that to you. And I have never been out since by myself.”
“Well, don’t forget, Sheila,” said her father, not very sure but that some sudden occasion might tempt the girl to her old deeds of recklessness.
The two American ladies had little to fear. 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. One evening she said to her friends, “Do you see that point that runs out on this side of the small island? Round that we enter Loch Roag.”
The last pale light of the sun was shining along the houses of Borvapost as the Princess Sheila passed. The people there had made out the yacht long ere she came close to land, and Mackenzie knew that twenty eager scouts would fly to tell the news to Scarlett and Duncan, so that ample preparation would be made in the newly-finished house down by the sea. The wind, however, had almost died away, and they were a long time getting into Loch Roag in this clear twilight. They who were making their first visit to Sheila’s island sat contentedly enough on deck, however, amazed and bewildered by the beauty of the scene around them. For now the sun had long sunk, but there was a glow all over the heavens, and only in the far East did the yellow stars begin to glimmer over the dark plain of the loch. Mealasabhal, Suainabhal, Cracabhal lifted their grand shoulders and peaks into this wondrous sky, and stood dark and clear there, with the silence of the sea around them.
As the night came on the yellow stars grew more intense overhead, but the lambent glow in the North did not pale.
They entered a small bay. Up there on a plateau of the rocks stood a long, low house, with all its windows gleaming in the dusk. The pinnace was put off from the yacht; in the strange silence of the night the ripples plashed around her prow; her oars struck fire in the water as the men rowed into the land. And then, as Sheila’s guests made their way up to the house, and when they reached the verandah and turned to look at the sea and the loch and the far mountains opposite, they beheld the clear and golden sickle of the moon rising from behind the black outline of Suainabhal into the soft and violet skies. As the yellow moon rose in the South a pathway of gold began to tremble on Loch Roag, and they could see the white curve of sand around the bay. The air was sweet with the cold smell of the sea. There was a murmur of the far Atlantic all around the silent coast.
It was the old familiar picture that had charmed the imagination of Sheila’s first and only lover, when as yet she was to him as some fair and wonderful princess living in a lonely island and clothed around about with the glamor of old legends and stories of the sea. Was she any longer this strange sea-princess, with dreams in her eyes and the mystery of the night and the stars written in her beautiful face? Or was she to him now, what all the world long ago perceived her to be, a tender wife, a faithful companion and a true and loyal-hearted woman? Sheila walked quietly into the house; there was something there for her friends to see, and, with a great pride and gentleness and gladness, Scarlett was despatched on a particular errand. The old King of Borva was still down at the yacht, looking after the landing of certain small articles of luggage. Duncan had come forward to Ingram and said, “And are you ferry well, sir?” and Mairi, come down from Mackenzie’s house, had done the same. Then there was a wild squeal of the pipes in the long apartment where supper was laid, the unearthly gathering cry of a clan, until Sheila’s husband dashed into the place and threatened to throw John into the sea if he did not hold his peace. John was offended, and would probably have gone up the hillside and, in revenge, played “Mackrimmon shall no more return,” only that he knew the irate old King of Borva would, in such a case, literally fulfill the threat that had been lightly uttered by his son-in-law. In another room, where two or three women were together, one of them suddenly took both of Sheila’s hands in hers and said, with a great look of kindness in her eyes, “My dear, I can believe now what you told me that night at Oban.”
