“The Callernish Stones, of course,” said Mackenzie himself; “it iss more than one hass come to the Lewis to see the Callernish Stones.”
Lavender had promised to the King of Borva a series of water-color drawings of Lewis, and Sheila was to choose the subjects from day to day. Mackenzie was gratified by this proposal, and accepted it with much magnanimity; but Sheila knew that before the offer was made Lavender had come to her and asked her if she cared about sketches, and whether he might be allowed to take a few on this journey and present them to her. She was very grateful, but suggested that it might please her papa if they were given to him. Would she superintend them, then, and choose the topics for illustration? Yes, she would do that; and so the young man was furnished with a roving commission.
He brought her a little sepia sketch of Borvapost, its huts, its bay, and its upturned boats on the beach. Sheila’s expressions of praise, the admiration and pleasure that shone in her eyes, would have turned any young man’s head. But her papa looked at the picture with a critical eye, and remarked, “Oh, yes, it is ferry good, but is not the color of Loch Roag at all. It is the color of a river where there is a flood of rain. I have neffer at all seen Loch Roag a brown color—neffer at all.”
It was clear then, that the subsequent sketches could not be taken in sepia, and so Lavender proposed to make a series of pencil-drawings, which could be washed in with color afterward. There was one subject, indeed, which since his arrival in Lewis he had tried to fix on paper by every conceivable means in his power, and that was Sheila herself. He had spoiled innumerable sheets of paper in trying to get some likeness of her which would satisfy himself, but all his usual skill seemed somehow to have gone from him. He could not understand it. In ordinary circumstances he could have traced in a dozen lines a portrait that would at least have shown a superficial likeness: he could have multiplied portraits by the dozen of old Mackenzie or Ingram or Duncan, but here he seemed to fail utterly. He invited no criticism, certainly. These efforts were made in his own room, and he asked no one’s opinion as to the likeness. He could, indeed, certify to himself that the drawing of the features was correct enough. There was the sweet and placid forehead, with its low masses of dark hair; there the short upper lip, the finely carved mouth, the beautifully-rounded chin and throat; and there the frank, clear, proud eyes, with their long lashes and highly-curved eyebrows. Sometimes, too, a touch of color added warmth to the complexion, put a glimmer of the blue sea beneath the long, black eyelashes, and drew a thread of scarlet around the white neck.
But was this Sheila? Could he take this sheet of paper to his friends in London and say, Here is the magical princess whom I hope to bring to you from the North, with all the glamour of the sea around her? He felt instinctively that there would be an awkward pause. The people would praise the handsome, frank, courageous head, and look upon the bit of red ribbon around the neck as an effective artistic touch. They would hand him back the paper with a compliment, and he would find himself in an agony of unrest because they had misunderstood the portrait, and seen nothing of the wonder that encompassed this Highland girl as if with a garment of mystery and dreams.
So he tore up portrait after portrait—more than one of which would have startled Ingram by its truth—and then, to prove to himself that he was not growing mad, he resolved to try a portrait of some other person. He drew a head of old Mackenzie in chalk, and was amazed at the rapidity and facility with which he executed the task. Then there could be no doubt as to the success of the likeness nor as to the effect of the picture. The King of Borva, with his heavy eyebrows, his aquiline nose, his keen gray eyes and flowing beard, offered a fine subject; and there was something really royal and massive and noble in the head that Lavender, well satisfied with his work, took down stairs one evening. Sheila was alone in the drawing-room, turning over some music.
“Miss Mackenzie,” he said, rather kindly, “would you look at this?”
Sheila turned around, and the sudden light of pleasure that leapt to her face was all the praise and all the assurance he wanted. But he had more than that. The girl was grateful to him beyond all the words she could utter; and when he asked her if she would accept the picture, she thanked him by taking his hand for a moment, and then she left the room to call in Ingram and her father. All the evening there was a singular look of happiness on her face. When she met Lavender’s eyes with hers there was a frank and friendly look of gratitude ready to reward him. When had he earned so much before by a simple sketch? Many and many a portrait, carefully executed and elaborately framed, had he presented to his lady friends in London, to receive from them a pretty note and a few words of thanks when next he called. Here with a rough chalk sketch he had awakened an amount of gratitude that almost surprised him, in the most beautiful and tender soul in this world; and had not this princess among women taken his hand for a moment as a childlike way of expressing her thanks, while her eyes spoke more than her lips? And the more he looked at those eyes, the more he grew to despair of ever being able to put down the magic of them in lines and colors.
At length, Duncan got the boat into the small creek at Callernish, and the party got out on the shore. As they were going up the steep path leading to the plain above, a young girl met them, who looked at them in rather a strange way. She had a fair, pretty, wondering face, with singularly high eyebrows, and clear, light blue eyes.
“How are you, Eily?” said Mackenzie, as he passed on with Ingram.