The Lindsays

by John K. Leys

FOOTNOTES:

[6] Moss.

CHAPTER X.

ARROCHAR.

The Clyde is not, except in the neighbourhood of Lanark, a particularly interesting river. When Scotchmen talk of the scenery of the Clyde they are thinking, not of the river, but of the frith which bears its name. When Alec Lindsay set out for Arrochar to enter upon his duties as tutor to Mr. Fraser’s boys, he embarked at Glasgow; and he was much disappointed to find that for the first part of his journey there was little to satisfy his love of the picturesque.

The day was gloomy; there were but few passengers on board the Chancellor. For a long way the narrow stream flowed between dull level fields. When it became broader there appeared a long dyke adorned with red posts surmounted by barrels, built in the channel to mark the passage. This did not add to the beauty of the scene. Now and then the steamer met one of her own class on its homeward journey; sometimes she overtook a queer, melancholy-looking, floating dredger, or a vessel outward-bound, towed by a small and abominably dirty tug-boat.

But about twenty miles below Glasgow the scene changed. A wide expanse of water stretched away to the horizon. On the left lay a large town over which hung a dense cloud of smoke, but away to the west, beyond the blue water, could be seen the bold bases of steep hills rising from the sea itself, their summits being hidden in the clouds. At Greenock all was life and bustle. Several steamers plying to different points of the coast lay at the pier, and a crowd of passengers who had come by train from Glasgow streamed down from the railway-station to meet them.

Alec stood on the bridge watching them with considerable amusement. Here was a group of elderly maiden ladies, sisters probably, to whom their month ‘at the salt water’ was the great event of the year. After much debate they had decided to go to Kilcreggan this year, instead of to Rothesay. Each carried an armful of wraps, small baskets, and brown-paper parcels, and each rushed to a separate steamer, as if thinking it more desirable that one at least should be right than that all should be wrong. Each appealed excitedly to a porter for directions, and eventually all assembled at the gangway of the proper steamer. But the combined evidence of the porters was insufficient. Each of the three travellers made a separate demand, one on the master, another on the chief officer, and a third upon the steward, in order to know whether the steamer was really going to Kilcreggan. At last they were satisfied, settled themselves with their belongings in a sheltered corner, and began to eat Abernethy biscuits.

Then came a whole family—an anxious mother, an aunt more anxious than the mother, two servants, and six children, who were running in different ways at once, and had to be manœuvred on board like so many young pigs. As soon as they were shipped, two of them immediately made for the engine-room, while the others rushed to the bulwarks, and craned their necks over the side as far as they possibly could without losing their balance.

In one corner was a little band of rosy school-girls in tweed frocks and straw hats, cumbered with a collection of novels, tennis-bats, and fishing-rods. Here and there were one or two gigantic Celts returning to the hill country, while a few pale-faced young men stepped on board with knapsacks on their shoulders. But the male passengers were few at this hour of the day. A few hours later the steamers would be black with men leaving the roar and worry of the city to sleep under the shadow of the hills.

At length the bells clanged for the last time; the gangways were pushed on shore; the old lady who always delays her departure till that period made her appearance, and was somehow hoisted on board; the escape-pipes ceased their roaring; and one after another the steamers glided off upon the bosom of the frith.

And now, suddenly, the sun shone out, showing that the sea was not a level plain of water, but covered with a million dancing wavelets. The sunshine travelled westward over the sea, and Alec followed it with his eyes. It rested on the distant hills, and then the haze that covered them melted away, and they revealed themselves, dim in outline, violet-coloured, magnified in the mist. As the steamer drew nearer them it became plain that the nearer hills were much lower than those beyond, and that many of them were covered with pines up to a certain height. Above the woods they were often black—that was where the old heather had been burnt to make room for the young shoots, or light brown—that was where masses of last year’s bracken lay; sometimes they were white with glistening rocks, or green from never-failing springs.

And now it could be seen that between the woods and the seashore ran a white road, and that the coast was dotted for miles with houses, of all shapes and sizes, each standing in its own ground, and sheltered by its own green leaves. There was no town anywhere—nothing approaching to one; but every three or four miles a few houses were built in a little row, affording accommodation for a grocer’s and a baker’s shop; and opposite the shops there was invariably a white wooden pier, affording an outlet to the rest of the world.

Soon after crossing the frith, the Chancellor made for one of these landing-places. Round the pier there swarmed half a dozen pleasure-boats of all sizes, some the merest cockleshells, navigated (not unskilfully) by mariners who were barely big enough to make the oars move through the water.

The rocky shore was adorned with groups of girls who were drying their hair after their morning’s dip in the sea, and dividing their attention between their novels, their little brothers in the boats just mentioned, and the approaching steamer. The water being deep close to the edge of the rocky coast, the pier was a very short one; and Alec Lindsay, looking over the edge, through the green water swirling round the piles of the pier, could see the pebbles on the shore twenty feet below.

Ropes were thrown out and caught, and hawsers were dragged ashore by their aid. With these the steamer was made fast at stem and stern, gangways were run on board, and a score of passengers disembarked. In another minute the steamer had been cast loose and had gone on her way. The pier, the pleasure-boats, the girls on the rocks, the white dusty road, the hedges of fuchsia, had disappeared. In a quarter of an hour another pier had been reached where exactly the same scene presented itself. No town, no promenade, no large hotels—not even a row of public bathing-machines, or a German band.

After three or four stoppages the Chancellor began to get fairly into Loch Long. The hills on either side were not high, and were covered only with grass and heather; but they had, nevertheless, a certain quiet beauty. It seemed as if they made a world of their own, and as if they were contemptuously indifferent to the foolish beings who came among them for an hour in their impudent, puffing steamer, and were gone like a cloud. Right in front was one bold eminence, perhaps a thousand or twelve hundred feet high, which divided the waters of the upper part of Loch Long from those of Loch Goil on the west. Gazing at its weather-beaten rocks and its sketches of silent moorland, one could hardly help tasting that renovating draught—the sense that one has reached a place where man is as nothing, a sphere which is but nominally under his sway, where he comes and goes, but leaves behind him no mark upon the face of nature.

Leaving this eminence upon the left, the channel became narrower, and the inlet seemed to be completely land-locked. In front the nearer hills seemed to lie one behind another, fold upon fold, while beyond some much loftier peaks raised their blue summits to heaven. Alec Lindsay never tired of gazing on them. If he turned away his eyes, it was that he might refresh them with a change of scene—the low green rock, the salt water washing the white stones under the heather on the hillside, the tiny rainbow in the foam of the paddle-wheels—and return with new desire to the sight of the everlasting hills. Strange, he thought to himself, as he gazed on the shadow of a cloud passing like a spirit over a lonely peak—strange that the sight of masses of mere dead earth and stone, the dullest and lowest forms of matter, should be able to touch us more profoundly than all the lovely sights and sweet sounds of the animated world!

In a few miles the top of the loch was reached. The mountains, standing like giants ‘to sentinel enchanted land,’ rose almost from the water’s edge. A few cottages stood clustering together at the mouth of a defile which gave access to Loch Lomond on the east. One or two large houses (of which ‘Glendhu,’ Mr. James Lindsay’s seaside residence, was one) stood at intervals along the shore.

Alec’s first care after landing was to provide himself with a lodging, as (much to his satisfaction) he was not required to live in Mr. Fraser’s house; and he was fortunate enough to find the accommodation he wanted in a cottage close to the seashore.

In the afternoon he called on Mrs. Fraser, and found her a fat, florid, good-natured looking woman, ostentatiously dressed, and surrounded by a troop of her progeny.

‘Come away, Mr. Lindsay,’ she said graciously, as she extended to him a remarkably well-developed hand and arm. ‘I’m just fairly delighted to see you. It will be an extraordinary pleasure to get rid of Hector and John Thompson, though it should be but for three hours in the day. You wouldn’t believe, Mr. Lindsay, what these two, not to speak of Douglas and Phemie—I often tell her father she should have been a boy—cost me in anxiety. I wonder I’m not worn to a shadow. The day before yesterday, now, not content with going in to bathe four times, they managed to drop Jamsie—that’s the one next to Douglas, Mr. Lindsay—over the edge of the boat, and the bairn wasn’t able to speak when they pulled him in again.’

‘Oh, ma!’ protested the young gentleman referred to, ‘I could have got in again by myself, only John Thompson hit me a whack on the head with his oar, trying to pull me nearer the boat.’

‘I don’t think it’s safe for the boys to be out in the little boat by themselves, without either me or their father to look after them. I don’t mind their being in the four-oar. What do you think, Mr. Lindsay?’

‘Really, I can hardly say, Mrs. Fraser, seeing that I know nothing of boating. I haven’t had a chance of learning; I hope you will give me a lesson,’ he added, turning to his new pupils.

The boys, who had been staring at Alec with a suspicious expression, brightened up at this; and it was arranged that the first lesson in boating should be given next day.

On the following afternoon Alec called at Glendhu, his uncle’s house, to inquire whether any of the family had arrived; and was told that they intended to come down in about a fortnight. In the evening, as he looked over his newspaper, his eyes fell upon a paragraph which informed him that Mr. Taylor, Professor of History in the University of Glasgow, had died suddenly the day before. Alec was shocked and surprised at the news; but the thought that was uppermost in his mind was that in all probability he would never see Laura Mowbray again. Now that her uncle was dead she would go back to her friends in London; and in a few months she would forget him. Not until that moment had Alec realized how constantly the thought of this girl had been in his mind, how he had made her image play a part in all his dreams. And now it was over! The world which had seemed so fair and bright but an hour ago was dull and lifeless now.

But the companionship of Mrs. Fraser’s boys and girls saved him from sinking into a foolish melancholy. He tried hard for three hours every day to make them learn a little Latin grammar and history, and a great part of every afternoon was spent in their company. They taught him to row and steer, and to manage a sail. But his chief delight was in the mountains. He was never tired of wandering among their lonely recesses; he loved the bare granite rocks and crags even better than the sheltered dell where the silver birches clustered round the rapid stream. He learned to know the hills from every point of view, to select at a glance the practicable side for an ascent; and before a fortnight was over he had set his foot on the top of every peak within walking distance of Arrochar.

About three weeks after his arrival, Alec heard that his uncle and Miss Lindsay had come down; and one evening soon afterwards he went to see them.

From the windows of the drawing-room at Glendhu the view was magnificent. Under the low garden-wall were the still, blue waters of the loch; and right in front ‘The Cobbler’ lifted his head against the glowing western sky.

Alec was waiting there in silence, absorbed in the spectacle, when he suddenly heard a soft voice behind him.

‘Mr. Lindsay!’

No need for him to turn round. The tones of her voice thrilled through every fibre of his body.

Yes; it was she, simply dressed in black, standing with a smile on her face, holding out her hand.

‘Why don’t you speak to me? Won’t you shake hands?’

‘Lau—— Miss Mowbray!’

‘Certainly. Am I a ghost?’

‘I thought you were far away—gone back to your friends in England.’

‘No,’ said Laura tranquilly, seating herself on a couch; ‘my poor uncle left me as a legacy to Mr. Lindsay; and here I am. You have not even said you are glad to see me.’

‘You know I am glad. But I was sorry to hear of your loss, and sorry to think of your grief.’

‘Yes; it was very sad, and so sudden,’ answered Laura, casting down her eyes. ‘And how did you come to be here?’ she asked, lifting them again to her companion’s face. Alec told her; and then his uncle and Miss Lindsay came into the room.

‘So you’ve got a veesitor?’ said the old lady to Laura, as she came forward.

‘Oh no!’ answered the girl. ‘I had no idea anyone was in the room when I came in; and your nephew stared at me as if I had been an apparition.’

She smiled as she spoke; but Alec noticed that as soon as the elder lady turned away the smile suddenly faded.

Nothing worth mentioning was said in the conversation that followed. Alec hoped that before he took his leave he would receive a general invitation to the house; but nothing of the kind was forthcoming. That, however, mattered little. Laura was here, close to him; they would be sure to meet; and of course he was at liberty to go to Glendhu occasionally. He went home to his lodgings wondering at his good fortune. The rosy hue had returned to the earth, and Arrochar was the most delightful spot on the habitable globe.

The one event of the day in the village was the arrival of the steamer and the departure of the coach which carried passengers to Tarbert on Loch Lomond. It was a favourite amusement of the inhabitants to lounge about the landing-place on these occasions, ostensibly coming for their letters and newspapers, but really pleased to see new faces and make comments about the appearance of the tourists. Laura Mowbray generally found it necessary to go to the post-office about the time of the steamer’s arrival; and Alec was not long in turning the custom to his own advantage.

As he was walking back with her to Glendhu one day, he noticed that she was rather abstracted.

‘I wonder what you are thinking of, Miss Mowbray,’ he said. ‘You have not answered me once since we left the pier.’

‘Haven’t I? I’m sure I beg your pardon.’

‘See that patch of sunlight on the hill across the loch!’ cried Alec enthusiastically. ‘See how it brings out the rich yellow colour of the moss, while all the rest of the hill is in shadow.’

‘You ought to have been a painter,’ said his companion.

‘Don’t you think Arrochar is a perfectly lovely place?’ returned Alec.

‘Yes; very pretty. But it is very dull.’

‘Dull?’

‘Yes; there is no life—no gaiety. It is said that the English take their pleasures sadly; but they are gaiety itself compared with you Scotch. You shut yourselves up in your own houses and don’t mix with your neighbours at all. At least you have no amusements in which anyone can share. The boating, tennis, bathing, everything is done en famille. There is no fun, no mixing with the rest of the world. In an English watering-place people stay at hotels, or in lodgings; and if they tire of one place they can go to another. Then they have parties of all kinds, and dances at the hotels. Here everyone takes a house for two months, and moves down with servants, plate, linen, groceries, perhaps even the family piano. I only wonder they don’t bring the bedsteads. Having got to their houses, they stay there, and perhaps never see a strange face till it is time to go back to town. It’s a frightfully narrowing system, not to speak of the dulness of it.’

‘I never thought of it before,’ said Alec. ‘I don’t care to know more people myself; I am never at my ease with people till I know them pretty well. But I am sorry if you find it dull.’

‘Well, of course I couldn’t go to dances or anything of that kind just yet; but it is dreadfully tiresome to see no one from one day to another, to have no games or amusements of any kind.’

‘There are always the hills, you know,’ said Alec.

Laura glanced at her companion to see whether he was laughing, and perceiving that he was perfectly serious, she turned away her face with a little moue.

‘The hills don’t amuse me; they weary me; and sometimes, when I get up in the night and look at them, they terrify me. Think what it would be to be up among those rocks on a winter’s night, with the snowflakes whirling around you, and the wind roaring—ugh! Let us talk of something else.’

They did so, but there was little spirit in the conversation. Alec could not conceive of anyone with a heart and a pair of eyes who should not love these mountain-tops as he did himself. He had already endowed Laura with every conceivable grace, and he had taken it for granted that the power to appreciate mountain scenery was among her gifts. Here, at least, was a deficiency, a point on which his mind and hers were not in harmony.

With feminine tact Laura saw that she had disappointed her companion in some way, and she easily guessed at the cause.

‘I see you don’t appreciate my straightforwardness,’ she said, after a little pause. ‘Knowing that you have such a passion for mountain scenery, I ought to have pretended that I was as fond of it as you are yourself.’

‘No, indeed.’

‘That would have been polite; but it would not have been quite straightforward. I always say the thing that comes uppermost, you know; I can’t help it.’

Of course she did; and of course her simple honesty was infinitely better than even a love of Scotch scenery. The latter would no doubt come with more familiar acquaintance with it. And was she not herself the most charming thing that the sun shone down upon that summer day?

Laura knew very well that this, or something like it, was the thought in the lad’s mind as he bade her good-day with lingering eyes. Perhaps she would not have been ill pleased if he had said what he was thinking; but it never entered into his head to pay the girl a compliment: he would have fancied it an impertinence.

‘What a queer, stupid boy he is!’ said Laura to herself, as she peeped back at him while she closed the gate behind her. ‘I can’t help liking him, but he is so provoking, with his enthusiastic, sentimental nonsense. Heigh-ho! There’s the luncheon-bell. And after that there are four hours to be spent somehow before dinner!’

CHAPTER XI.

A RIVAL.

‘Hullo! Semple!’

‘Hullo! Alec!’

‘Didn’t expect to see you here.’

‘As little did I expect to see you.’

‘When did you come?’

‘Only last night; by an excursion steamer.’

‘Staying with Uncle James?’

‘Yes: he asked me to spend my holidays down here, and I thought I might as well come.’

‘How long do you get?’

‘Three weeks; but I may take a month.’

An unreasonable jealousy of his cousin sprang up in Alec’s breast at that moment. Five minutes before he was perfectly satisfied with his lot; now, because another occupied a more favourable position than himself, he was miserable. He had been able to meet Laura nearly every day; but this fellow was to live under the same roof with her, to eat at the same table, to breathe the same air. To see her and talk to her would be his rival’s daily, hourly privilege.

‘Splendid hills!’ said Semple.

Alec made no reply. The scenery was too sacred a subject to be discussed with one like Semple.

‘What do you do with yourself all day?’ asked the new-comer.

‘Oh, I take a swim in the morning, give the boys their lessons from ten to one; then I generally take a row, or a walk, or read some Horace.’

‘I should think you’d get dreadfully tired of it, after a bit. There are no places where they play tennis, I suppose?’

‘Not that I know of.’

‘I expect I shall find it rather dull.’

Another jealous pang shot through Alec’s heart. Laura and his cousin were agreed on this point. What more natural than that they should amuse each other? In a day or two Semple would be on better terms with Laura than he was himself. Of course he would fall in love with her—and she?

Anyone watching the course of affairs at Glendhu would have thought that Alec’s foreboding was in a fair way of being realized. Laura was very gracious to her guardian’s nephew, and overlooked in the prettiest manner his little vulgarities. The two were constantly together, and neither seemed to feel the want of a more extended circle of acquaintance. It was nobody’s fault, for Semple had been invited to Glendhu before Mr. Taylor’s death had caused Laura to become a member of Mr. Lindsay’s family; but Miss Lindsay determined that she would at least introduce another guest into the house. She wrote to Alec’s sister, and asked her to spend a fortnight at Loch Long.

When the invitation reached the Castle Farm, Margaret’s first impulse was to decline it without saying anything to her father, partly out of shyness and a sense of the deficiencies in her wardrobe, partly because she could not easily at that season be spared from the farm. But when Mr. Lindsay asked if there was anything in her aunt’s letter, Margaret felt bound to mention the matter to him; and he at once insisted upon her going.

Margaret’s advent, however, made little practical difference in the usual order of things at Glendhu. Mr. Semple at first offered her a share of his attentions; but she received them so coldly that he soon ceased to trouble himself about her, and devoted himself to Laura as before, while Margaret seemed perfectly contented with her own society when Miss Lindsay was not with her guests.

There was little intimacy between the two girls, and the blame of this could not fairly be attributed to Laura.

‘I am so glad you have come, Miss Lindsay,’ she had said on the first occasion when they were left alone together. ‘May I call you “Margaret”? I think it is such a perfectly lovely name.’

‘Of course you may,’ said the matter-of-fact Margaret.

‘And you will call me “Laura,” of course.’

But Margaret avoided making any reply to this, and practically declined to adopt the more familiar style of address; and Laura soon returned to the more formal ‘Miss Lindsay.’

Alec was, of course, more frequently at his uncle’s, now that his sister was staying there; but his visits did not afford him much satisfaction. With Semple he had little in common. There was a natural want of sympathy between the two; and besides, Semple looked down upon Alec as being ‘countrified,’ while Alec was disposed to hold his cousin in contempt for his ignorance of everything unconnected with the making and the sale of paraffin oil. As to Laura, he seldom had a chance of saying much to her; while his intercourse with his sister was more constrained than it had ever been before. Margaret saw quite plainly that as her brother was talking to her, his eyes and his heart were hankering after Laura Mowbray; and she felt mortified by his want of interest in what she said to him, though she was too proud to show her feeling, except by an additional coldness of manner.

One evening Alec called at Glendhu, and, as usual, he found the younger portion of the family in the garden. Margaret was sitting by herself on a bench overlooking the sea, with some knitting in her hand, while the other two were sauntering along one of the paths at a little distance. Alec waited till they came up, and then he said:

‘I have borrowed Mr. Fraser’s light skiff; suppose we all go for a row? You can row one skiff and I the other,’ he added, turning to Semple.

‘Oh, delightful!’ cried Laura. ‘It is just the evening for a row. You will come, Miss Lindsay, won’t you?’

‘I have no objections,’ said Margaret, quite indifferently.

Laura turned and ran into the house for wraps, while a rather awkward silence fell upon the rest of the party. Semple moved away from Margaret almost at once, and hung about the French window, so as to be ready to intercept Laura as soon as she issued from the house. Alec felt in a manner bound to remain with his sister; and she would not see his evident desire to follow Semple to the house, and so have a chance of securing Laura for his companion. When at length the English girl appeared, with a dark-green plaid thrown over her shoulder, Semple sprang at once to her side; and, without paying the slightest attention to Alec or his sister, they hurried down to the water’s edge. In a few minutes more they had appropriated the best of the two boats (the one Alec had borrowed) and were floating far out on the loch.

Alec could not help his disappointment appearing in his face; and his sister noticed and resented it.

‘Don’t row at such a furious rate; you’ll snap the oars,’ she said tranquilly, as her brother sent the boat careering over the waves.

He stopped, and tried to look pleasant, but he could not shut his ears to the gay laughter that came to him across the water from the other boat.

‘They seem merry enough,’ said Alec.

‘Yes,’ said Margaret spitefully. ‘Miss Mowbray seems in very good spirits, considering that her uncle has not been dead much more than a month.’

‘How unjust you are!’ cried Alec hotly. ‘As if she ought to shut herself up, and never laugh, because her uncle died! It would be hypocrisy if she did.’

‘There I quite agree with you,’ said Margaret, with an ill-natured smile.

‘You mean that Laura could not be sincerely sorry?’

‘I think she is very shallow and heartless,’ said Margaret, sweetly tranquil as ever.

Alec was furious.

‘You girls are all alike,’ he said with suppressed passion. ‘Either you are always kissing and praising one another, or running each other down. And the more refinement, and delicacy, and beauty another girl has, the more you depreciate her.’

Margaret merely curled her lip contemptuously, and sat trailing her hand through the water, without making any reply.

Nothing more was said till Alec was helping his sister out of the boat on their returning to land.

‘Don’t let us quarrel. I am sorry if I have vexed you, Maggie,’ he said.

‘I’m not vexed,’ she answered, in a not very reassuring tone, keeping her eyes upon the rocks at her feet.

Her brother’s real offence was that he had fallen in love with Laura, and that she now occupied a very secondary place in his heart. And that she could not forgive.

‘Won’t you come up to the house?’ she asked.

‘No; and you can tell that cad that the next time he wants Mr. Fraser’s boat he had better borrow it himself.’

So saying, Alec shouldered the oars and strode away.

Though he had defended Laura passionately when his sister spoke her mind about that young lady, Alec felt that he had been badly used. He had certainly made the proposal to the whole party, but he had pointedly looked at Laura and spoken to her; and she had replied in the same way. There was, indeed, a tacit understanding between them at the moment, that she would be his partner for the evening; and it was chiefly from a spirit of coquetry that she had chosen to ignore it afterwards.

But Laura showed no trace of embarrassment when she met Alec in the village next day.

‘Why didn’t you come into the house last night?’ she said with a smile.

‘I didn’t think it mattered.’

‘Why are you so cross? I suppose I have managed to offend you again. I never saw anyone so touchy and unreasonable!’

‘It doesn’t very much matter—does it?’

‘Why?’

‘I mean, you don’t really care whether—oh!—never mind.’

‘Now, I really believe you are annoyed because I went in your cousin’s boat last night, instead of yours. But what could I do? I couldn’t say, “I prefer to go with Mr. Lindsay”—could I?’

‘No; but—but you never seem to think of me at all now, Miss Mowbray.’

‘Nonsense!’ answered the girl, as a pleased blush came over her face. ‘And to prove my goodwill, I’ll tell you what I will do. I will let you take me for a row this evening.’

‘Will you?’

This was said so eagerly that Laura could not help blushing again.

‘The others are going to dine at Mr. Grainger’s to-night, over at Loch Lomond side.’

‘But I am to be with the Frasers to-night!’ exclaimed Alec in dismay. ‘Would not to-morrow night do as well?’ Then, seeing that his companion did not seem to care for this change of plans, he added: ‘But I dare say I can manage to get away by half-past eight. That would not be too late, would it? It is quite light until after nine.’

‘I will be in the garden, then; but I must go now,’ said Laura hurriedly, as she bade him good-day.

The evening went by as on leaden feet with Alec Lindsay, as he talked to Mr. Fraser, or listened to his wife’s interminable easy-going complaints about her children and her servants, and tried to appear interested, and at his ease. He could not keep the thought of the coming meeting out of his mind.

With rather a lame excuse he left Mr. Fraser’s house not many minutes after the appointed time, and very soon afterwards he was gliding under the garden-wall of Glendhu. For some minutes no one was visible, and Alec began to fear that a new disappointment was in store for him. But presently a figure began to move through the shadows of the trees. It was Laura! She stepped without a word over the loose rocks and stones; then, hardly touching Alec’s outstretched hand, she lightly took her place at the stern, and met Alec’s gaze with a smile.

‘Do you know, I feel horribly guilty, and all through you,’ she said, as the boat moved swiftly out into the loch.

‘Why should it make any difference that there is no discontented fellow-creature in another boat behind us?’ asked Alec gaily.

Laura shook her head, but made no reply. Leaning back in the stern she took off her hat, and let the cool breeze blow upon her face. Alec thought he had never seen her look so beautiful. The delicate curves of her features, the peach-like complexion, the melting look in her eyes, made him feel as if the girl seated near him was something more than human.

‘Don’t you think we have gone far enough?’ said Laura gently, when Alec had rowed some way in silence.

He stopped, resting on his oars.

‘How still it is—and how beautiful!’ she exclaimed in the same low voice.

Not a sound but the faint lapping of the water on the boat fell upon their ears. The hills were by this time in darkness, and the stars were beginning to glimmer in the twilight sky. Beyond the western hills the sky was still bright, with a glow that seemed less that of the sunken sun, than some mysterious halo of the northern night. A faint phosphorescence lingered about the drops of sea-water upon the oars. Nothing but the distant lights in the cottage windows seemed to be in any way connected with the commonplace, everyday world.

‘Hadn’t we better go back? It is really getting dark,’ said Laura, as gently as before; and Alec obediently dipped his oars and turned the bow of the boat towards Glendhu.

All his life long Alec remembered that silent row in the dim, unearthly twilight. There was no need for words. They were sitting, as it were, ‘on the shores of old romance,’ and tasting the dew of fairyland. That hidden land was for this short hour revealed to them; they were breathing the enchanted air.

It was almost dark when Alec shipped his oars and drew the boat along the rocks outside the garden-wall.

‘How dreadfully late it is! I hope they have not come back,’ said Laura, as she rose to go ashore.

Alec took her hand, so small and white, with the tiny blue veins crossing it, in his own rough brown fingers, and when he had helped the girl ashore he stooped and kissed it.

A moment afterwards, a soft ‘good-night’ from the garden assured him that the act of homage had not been taken amiss. If he had lingered a minute or two longer he would have heard Miss Lindsay’s voice calling out in some anxiety, and Laura Mowbray’s silvery accents replying:

‘Yes; here I am, Miss Lindsay—it is so much cooler out of doors. My headache is almost quite gone, thank you; the cool sea-breeze has driven it away. How did you enjoy your party? How I wish I could have gone with you!’

But before Laura reached the house, Alec was once more far out in the loch. He wished to be alone, to indulge the sweet intoxication which was burning in his veins.

When at last he returned to his little room he found a letter awaiting him which had been sent on from home. The address was in an unfamiliar handwriting, and breaking the seal he read as follows:

‘Caen Lodge, Highgate, N.,
‘July 10, 187-.

‘My dear Lindsay,

‘You will be surprised to hear that you may see me the day after this reaches you. I want to see how your beautiful river scenery looks in this glorious summer weather. If it is not convenient for me to stay at the farm, I can easily find quarters elsewhere.

‘Ever yours,

‘Hubert Blake.’

As Alec foresaw, when he read this note, Blake found existence at the Castle Farm with the sole companionship of Mr. Lindsay to be quite impracticable; and next day he arrived at Arrochar and took up his quarters in the little inn at the head of the pier.

CHAPTER XII.

‘YOU MUST GIVE ME AN ANSWER.’

Margaret Lindsay, not the scenery of the Nethan, was the real attraction which drew Hubert Blake to the north. He was not in love with her; certainly, at least, he felt for her nothing of the rapturous passion which Alec felt for Laura Mowbray. But he admired her immensely. He undertook the long journey from London that he might feast his eyes on her beauty once more; and when he found that she was at Arrochar he straightway betook himself thither.

Blake was by this time a man nearer forty than thirty years of age, who was still without an aim in life. He had an income which rendered it unnecessary for him to devote himself to the ordinary aim of an Englishman—the making of money; and to set himself to charm sovereigns which he did not need out of the pockets of his fellow-creatures into his own, for the mere love of gold or of luxury, was an idea which he would have despised as heartily as Alec Lindsay himself would have done. Blake had also great contempt for the brassy self-importance and self-conceit which is the most useful of all attributes for one who means to get on in the world. He looked at men struggling for political or social distinction, as he might have gazed at a crowd of lunatics fighting for a tinsel crown. ‘And after all,’ he would say to himself, ‘if I am idle, my idleness hurts no one but myself. At least, I do not trample down my fellow-men on my journey through life.’

He was not satisfied; but he was not energetic enough to find a career in which he could turn his talents and his money to good advantage. He was a great lover of nature, and he had a wide and tolerant sympathy for his fellow-men. The one thing he loved in the world was art.

It was not long, of course, before he was a member of the little circle at Glendhu, and he looked on at the little comedy that was being played there with good-natured amusement. Laura Mowbray soon discovered that the stranger was insensible to her charms, that he quite understood her little allurements, and regarded them with a good-humoured smile. He saw quite plainly that she was enjoying a double triumph; and on the whole he thought that though she devoted by far the greater part of her time to Semple, she had a secret preference for his friend Alec. He spent most of his time in making sketches of the surrounding scenery; and though he was not an enthusiastic climber, Alec was often able to persuade him to accompany him to some of the loftier peaks.

One day before Margaret’s visit came to an end, Alec proposed that the whole party—that is, Blake, Laura Mowbray, his sister, Semple, and himself—should make an ascent of ‘The Cobbler.’ He described the view which was to be obtained from the top of the mountain in terms which fired even Laura’s enthusiasm; and the ascent was fixed for the following forenoon.

The morning was rather cloudy, but not sufficiently so to make the party abandon the expedition, especially as Alec pointed out that they would find it much easier to climb than they would have done if the day had been one of brilliant sunshine. They rowed over to the foot of the hill, so as to save walking round the head of the loch; and were soon in a wilderness of heather and wild juniper.

The ascent, they found, though by no means difficult, was long and tiresome. The girls, indeed, if they had consulted merely their own inclination, would have turned back at the end of the first hour; but it never occurred to Margaret to give way to her feeling of fatigue, and Laura was too proud to be the first to complain.

Everyone was glad, however, when Blake proposed a halt about half-way up. They threw themselves down on the heather, and tasted the delicious sense of rest to strained muscles and panting lungs.

‘I am afraid this is rather too much for you,’ said Alec to Laura, noticing her look of weariness.

‘Oh, I shall get on after I have rested,’ she replied; ‘but it is so tiresome to imagine, every now and then, that the crest before you is the top of the hill, and to find when you arrive there that the real summit seems farther off than ever.’

‘The finest views are always to be had half-way up a mountain,’ said Blake. ‘How much we can see from this knoll! There is Loch Lomond, Ben Lomond, Ben Venue, and I don’t know how many Bens besides—a perfect crowd of them. Then we can see right down the loch and out into the frith. Let us be content with what we have. Miss Mowbray and your sister would prefer, I think, to wait here with me, Alec, while you and your cousin get to the top and back again.’

But this proposal was not entertained; and in a quarter of an hour the whole party were on foot once more.

Up to this point Semple had succeeded in monopolizing the society of Laura; but he had found that to guide the steps of a delicately nurtured girl over a rough Scotch mountain, and help her whenever she came to a steep place, was no light labour. For the rest of the climb he was content to leave her a good deal to Alec, while it fell to Blake’s lot to look after Margaret.

One after another the ridges were overcome, the prospect widening with every step, till the last grassy knoll was surmounted, and the bare rocky peak stood full in view at a little distance. It was, indeed, so steep that Laura was secretly terrified, and had to be hauled up for a good part of the way.

An involuntary cry burst from the lips of each, as one by one they set foot upon the windy summit. Far away, as it were upon the limits of the world, the sun was shining on a sea of gold. The two peaks of Jura lifted up their heads, illumined by the radiance. All around them was a billowy sea of mountain-tops—Ben Crois, Ben Ime, Ben Donich, Ben Vane, Ben Voirlich, and a hundred more, with many a lonely tarn, and many a glen without a name. At their feet lay the black waters of the lochs; and far in the south were the rugged hills of Arran.

‘Look!’ cried Laura, ‘the steamer is no bigger than a toy-boat; and the road is like a thin white thread drawn across the moor!’

‘Come here,’ said Alec to Blake with a laugh, beckoning as he spoke.

Blake followed him, and found that on one side, where there was a sheer descent of many hundred feet, a rock, which was pierced with a natural archway, jutted out from the body of the mountain.

‘This is the “needle-eye,”’ said Alec, ‘and everybody who comes up here is expected to go through it.’

‘Nonsense! Why, man, a false step there would mean——’

‘There’s not the slightest danger, if you have a good head. I have been through twice already,’ returned Alec, as he disappeared behind the rock.

A cry from Laura told Blake that she had witnessed the danger. Margaret, whose cheek had suddenly grown pale, gripped her tightly by the arm.

‘Don’t speak,’ she said hoarsely; ‘it may make his foot slip.’

In a minute he reappeared, having passed through the crevice.

‘Alec, you shouldn’t do a thing like that; it’s a sin to risk your life for nothing,’ said Margaret, in a tone of cold displeasure.

‘There’s not the slightest danger in it,’ protested Alec.

‘None whatever,’ echoed Semple; but he did not think it necessary to prove the truth of his opinion.

‘I think we ought to be off,’ said Alec; ‘there’s a cloud coming right upon us; and if we don’t make haste we shall have to stay here till it passes.’

His meaning was not quite plain to his companions; but they soon saw the force of his remark. They had accomplished but a small part of the descent when they found themselves suddenly in the midst of a cold, thick, white vapour. It was not safe to go on, so the little company crouched together under a boulder, and watched the great wreaths of mist moving in the stillness from crag to crag.

As soon as the mist got a little thinner, they recommenced the descent, for their position was not a very pleasant one. Semple was in front, while Blake and Margaret followed, and Alec and Laura brought up the rear, when it happened that they came to an unusually steep part of the hillside which they thought it best to cross in a slanting direction. The soil was of loose, crumbling stone, with here and there a narrow patch of short, dry grass, and, at intervals, narrow beds or courses of loose stones. A short distance below there was an unbroken precipice of at least five hundred feet.

Alec was helping Laura across one of those narrow beds of stones, the others being some little way in advance, when they were startled by a deep rumbling noise, and a tremulous motion under their feet. The whole layer of stones, loosened by the rain and frost, was sliding down towards the precipice! With a cry Alec hurried his companion on; but her trembling feet could hardly support her. The movement of the stones, slow at first, was becoming faster every moment; and Alec’s only hope lay in crossing them before they were carried down to the edge of the cliff. For a minute it seemed doubtful whether they would be able to cross in time; but Alec succeeded in struggling, along with his half-fainting companion, to the edge of the sliding stones, and placed her, just in time, upon a sloping but solid bank of earth.

In a few minutes more the stones had swept past them, and had disappeared over the cliff.

But the position which Alec had reached was hardly less dangerous than the one they had escaped from. Behind them was a deep chasm which the treacherous stones had left. In front the mountain rose at a terrible slope. Alec scanned it closely, and it seemed to him that though he might have scaled it at a considerable risk, it was quite impracticable for Laura without help from above. If he were to make the attempt, and fall, he knew he would infallibly dash her as well as himself over the precipice.

Some feet above their heads there was a ledge of rock from which it might be possible to assist them; but where were Blake and the others? They were out of sight, and the sound of Alec’s shouts, cut off by the rocks above, could not reach them. Worst of all, the mist seemed to be closing upon them more thickly than ever.

The question was, Could they maintain their position till help could reach them? Soon it became evident that they could not. The ledge of grass-covered rock on which they stood was so narrow that they could not even sit down; and it was plain that Laura could not stand much longer.

There was only one way of escape. Eight or ten feet below was a shelf of rock, frightfully narrow, and, what was worse, sloping downwards and covered with slippery dry grass. But Alec saw that if he could reach it, he could make his way round to the top of the rock, and then he could stretch down his hand so as to help Laura up the steep.

‘Oh, Mr. Lindsay, what shall we do?’ cried Laura, turning to Alec her white, despairing face. ‘Oh, look down there! What a dreadful death!’

‘Death! Nonsense! There is no danger—not much, at least. See, now, I am going to drop down on that bit of grassy rock, and climb round to the top. Then I’ll be able to help you up.’

‘But I could never climb up there! I should fall, and be killed in a moment!’

‘Not a bit, if you have hold of my hand.’

‘But you won’t leave me?’ cried Laura, clutching Alec by the arm as she spoke; ‘you won’t leave me all alone in this dreadful place?’

‘Only for a minute.’

‘But I can’t stand any longer.’

‘Yes, you can. Turn your face to the rock, and lean against it. Don’t look downwards on any account.’

And with these words Alec slipped off his shoes, slung them round his neck, and let himself hang over the cliff. It was an awful moment, and for a second or two the lad’s courage failed him. But it was only for an instant. Setting his teeth hard, he let go, and dropped upon the little shelf beneath. His feet slid; but he clung to the rock and just saved himself from slipping over the precipice. Then, with great exertion, he managed to climb round where the ascent was not quite so steep, and gained the ledge above that on which he had left his companion.

‘All right!’ he cried cheerily, looking over the ledge; and, lying down, he grasped the rock with one hand, and stretched the other downwards as far as he could.

But by this time Laura was almost paralyzed with terror.

‘I can’t—I can’t move!’ she exclaimed in a voice of agony, while her eyes wandered as if seeking the abyss she dreaded.

Alec stretched himself downwards till he could almost touch her hat, while the beads of perspiration stood out on his forehead.

‘Give me your hand at once!’ he shouted imperiously.

Almost mechanically the girl put her hand in his, and the firm clasp immediately made her more calm.

‘Now put your foot on that tuft of grass at your knee. Don’t be afraid. I tell you, you can’t fall, if you do as I bid you!’

Laura felt as if her arm were being pulled out of its socket; but she obeyed, and in another moment she was in safety.

Then came a flood of hysterical tears.

‘Oh, how cruel you are! Why did you ever bring me to this horrible place? Where are the others? What will become of us? Don’t leave me; take me back! Oh, take me back!’ And she clung to her companion as if she were still in danger of her life.

Alec soothed and encouraged her as well as he was able; and by hurrying forward they managed in half an hour to overtake the rest of the party.

‘What in the world have you been about?’ cried Semple. ‘We began to think you had lost your way in the mist, or had tumbled over a precipice.’

‘So we did, very nearly,’ said Laura; and Margaret, seeing that the girl was pale and trembling, went up to her, threw her arms round her, and promised not to leave her till they were safe at Glendhu.

‘You needn’t have taken her into danger,’ growled Semple.

‘I did nothing of the kind,’ said Alec angrily. Then he bit his lip, and vouchsafed no further explanation.

Without further accident they reached the foot of the mountain, and half an hour later landed at Glendhu.

Laura had not quite recovered from her fright on the following morning, when an extremely welcome piece of news restored her to her usual spirits. Mr. Lindsay had suddenly determined to transfer himself and his family to Paris; and Laura was overjoyed. When Alec called, therefore, in the afternoon, to ask how she was, he found her in the garden, dreaming of the coming pleasure, and in high good-humour.

‘You know, I was so dreadfully sorry for that accident,’ said Alec. ‘I almost felt as if I had been to blame. But I couldn’t help the landslip, could I?’

‘Oh, of course not. And you must forget all the foolish things I said when I was in that terrible place. How brave you were! I am sure I owe you my life.’

‘Next time we go a-climbing, we shan’t go where there are any precipices,’ said Alec.

‘But we can’t go climbing any more,’ said Laura, with visible satisfaction. ‘Haven’t you heard? We are all to set out for Paris the day after to-morrow.’

‘For Paris!’

‘Yes; and perhaps, after that, we may go to Italy. Isn’t it splendid?’

‘Very—for you. But——’

He stopped, almost frightened at the audacious thought that had come into his mind. His pulses leaped, his heart throbbed, and his cheek grew pale.

Laura looked at him curiously.

‘“But”—what?’ she asked.

‘But it will be very lonely for me. Life does not seem worth living when you are not near me.’ And then, hardly knowing what he said, he poured out the story of his love. He seized her hands, as they lay idly in her lap, and seemed unconscious of the efforts she made to withdraw them. He gazed into her face, and repeated his words with passionate earnestness, again and again:—‘I love you, Laura; I love you; I love you!’

Laura threw a glance around, to make sure that no one was in sight; and then, slipping her hands away, she covered with them her blushing face. When she looked up, she met Alec’s passionate gaze with a smile.

‘Oh, hush! hush!’ she said. ‘Why do you speak so wildly?’

‘Because I love you.’

‘But we are far too young to think of such things. I don’t mean to get married for—oh! ever such a long time. And you—you have to take your degree, and choose a profession. We will forget all this, and we shall be friends still, just as before.’

‘It can never be just as before,’ said Alec.

‘Why not?’

‘It is impossible. But you won’t refuse me, Laura?’ he pleaded. ‘If you only knew how much I love you! Don’t you love me a little in return? Sometimes I can’t help thinking you do.’

‘Then all I can say is, you have a very strong imagination.’

‘You don’t?’ cried Alec despairingly.

Laura shook her head, but smiled at the same time.

‘You must give me an answer,’ said Alec, rising to his feet. He was dreadfully in earnest.

‘And I say that at your age and mine it is ridiculous to talk of such things.’

‘Nonsense! We are not too young to love each other. Can you love me, Laura? What you have said is no answer at all.’

‘I’m afraid it’s the only answer I can give you,’ said Laura, with a saucy smile, rising in her turn, and gliding past her companion. ‘Don’t be absurd; and don’t be unkind or disagreeable when we meet again, after we come back from our tour. Good-bye.’

He stood, looking after her, without saying another word. And she, turning when she reached the French window, and seeing him still standing there, waved her hand to bid him adieu, before she disappeared.

END OF VOL. I.

BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD.