The Lone Adventure

by Halliwell Sutcliffe

Rupert had changed his trade of messenger for that of boat-man, and was one of the six rowers who rested on their oars in the roomy fishing-coble that was waiting to carry the Prince to Skye. There was a wild gale blowing, but the June night was clear with a sort of tempered daylight, and Rupert watched these two, standing on the strip of sandy shore, with a queer sense of intuition. The discipline of night-riding, its loneliness and urgency, teaches a man to look on at any happening with eyes keen for the true, sharp detail of it; and the two figures, as he saw them now, seemed transfigured, secure for the moment in some dream of a past life they had shared together.

There was the Prince, his head lifted buoyantly, his lips smiling as if Culloden had never been. There was Miss MacDonald—four-and-twenty, keen for loyalty and sacrifice—with something more than loyalty making a happy light about her face. She had none of the fripperies that set men’s wits astray and poison their clean hold on life; but, from her buckled shoes to her brown, shapely head, she was trim, and debonair, and bonnie, made to keep pace with men along the road of high endeavour.

Rupert, resting on his oar, felt a touch of loneliness and heartache. This lass of MacDonald’s recalled the Lancashire hills to him because she was so like Nance Demaine, for whose sake he was proving himself along the troubled ways. And then he had no time for heartache; for the Prince was handing Miss MacDonald into the boat, and the rowers were bidden to make for the first unguarded landing-place in Skye which they could find.

They had an evil passage. The wind never ceased to wail and scream across the foamy breakers, but the storm was not dark enough to hide them, and in the half-light their boat showed clear against the grey-blue of the heaving seas. Gunboats were out, searching for the fugitive, who was known to be somewhere in among the isles; and once a hail of shot passed over them from a man-of-war that set sail in pursuit, but could not take them because the wind was contrary.

For eight hours the rowers strove with the long passage overseas from Uist, their arms unwearying at the oars. And the Prince would take more than his share of the toil, telling them that he was the cause of this night voyage and should lend a willing hand on that account. They came to Skye at long last, and tried to put in at Waternish on the west coast, but found a company of soldiery encamped about a roaring fire, and had to put back again into the teeth of the wind. And, as if wind and seas were not enough, the men on shore pursued them with a rousing volley. One bullet struck the boat’s side, and a score others hit the water close about them, and rebounded, and went out across the waves with a sharp, mournful wail, shrill as the pipes when they are sorrowful.

No one on board was hit; but the Prince, seeing Miss MacDonald shrink, put out a hand and touched her, as a devout lover might. And the two took hurried counsel. It seemed best to cross Snizort Loch, and so reach Monkstadt, where a kinsman of her own would give them shelter—unless there, too, the soldiery were quartered.

The Prince wished once again to take an oar, though his hands were raw and bleeding; but no man would give up the rowing that, for sake of him they carried, was pleasant to them; and so, lest he should be idle altogether, he sang old, loyal songs to them, and jested, and made their burden lighter—a gift of his. And then Miss MacDonald, whose pluck was not to be denied, broke down for a little while, because she was spent with endeavour and the wild tumult of the Stuart’s coming. And Rupert, tugging at his oar, watched the Prince persuade her to lie down in the bottom of the coble, saw him take off his plaid and cover her with practical and quiet solicitude, as if he had the right to guard her.

And through the rest of that night-crossing the Prince kept stubborn guard about his rescuer, who was sleeping now like a child, lest any of the rowers should touch her with his foot in moving up and down to ease his limbs. And Rupert, though his wits were muddled with incessant toil by land and sea, felt something stir at the soul of him, as he saw the way of the Prince’s regard for this daughter of the MacDonalds. Again it seemed to him that these two had known each other long ago, before the world grew old, and tired, and prone to gossip. And again he remembered Nance Demaine, who had touched his boyhood with the fire that does not die.

They came to Monkstadt in safety, but learned that the enemy was in possession of the house. And afterwards it was to and fro on foot across the good isle of Skye, for many days, until they came to the house of Kingsborough, where Flora’s home was with her mother and stepfather.

It was a queer incoming, touched with laughter and the needs of every day, as all big enterprises are until we view them in the retrospect. There was Kingsborough—the biggest of the big MacDonalds—going in before to prepare his wife for the intrusion. And he was manifestly afraid, as the big, open-air men are when they are dwarfed by house-walls and the indoor cleanliness.