White Heather: A Novel (Volume 3 of 3)

by William Black

Awake, awake, Love Meenie,

To show them their mistress and queen!

And it could hardly be expected that she should bring any very keen critical scrutiny to bear on these careless verses of Ronald's (of which she had now obtained a goodly number, by dint of wheedling and entreaty, and even downright insistence), seeing that nearly all of them were written in her praise and honour; but even apart from that she had convinced herself that they were very fine indeed; and that one or two of them were really pathetic; and she was not without the hope that, when the serious affairs of life had been attended to, and a little leisure and contemplation become possible, Ronald might turn to his poetical labours again and win some little bit of a name for himself amongst a few sympathetic souls here and there. That he could do so, if he chose, she was sure enough. It was all very well for him to make light of these scraps and fragments; and to threaten to destroy them if she revealed the fact of their existence to anybody; but she knew their worth, if he did not; and when, in this or that magazine or review, she saw a piece of poetry mentioned with praise, her first impulse was to quickly read it in order to ask herself whether Ronald—given time and opportunity—could not have done as well. Moreover, the answer to that question was invariably the same; and it did not leave her unhappy. It is true (for she would be entirely dispassionate) he had not written anything quite so fine as 'Christabel'—as yet; but the years were before him; she had confidence; the world should see—and give him a fitting welcome all in good time.

When, on this clear morning, she was fully equipped for her walk, she stole silently down the stair, and made her way out into the now awakening day. The little hamlet was showing signs of life. A stable-lad was trying to get hold of a horse that had strayed into the meadow; a collie was barking its excitement over this performance; the pretty Nelly appeared carrying an armful of clothes to be hung out to dry. And then, as Meenie passed the inn, she was joined by Harry the terrier, who, after the first grovelling demonstrations of joy, seemed to take it for granted that he was to be allowed to accompany her. And she was nothing loth. The fact was, she was setting out in quest of that distant eyrie of Ronald's of which he had often told her; and she doubted very much whether she would be able to find it; and she considered that perhaps the little terrier might help her. Would he not naturally make for his master's accustomed resting-place, when they were sufficiently high up on the far Clebrig slopes?

So they went away along the road together; and she was talking to her companion; and telling him a good deal more about Glasgow, and about his master, than probably he could understand. Considering, indeed, that this young lady had just been sent home in deep disgrace, she seemed in excellent spirits. She had borne the parting admonitions and upbraidings of her sister Agatha with a most astonishing indifference; she had received her mother's reproaches with a placid equanimity that the little woman could not understand at all (only that Meenie's face once or twice grew fixed and proud when there was some scornful reference to Ronald); and she had forthwith set about nursing her father—who had caught a severe chill and was in bed—with an amiable assiduity, just as if nothing had happened. As regards her father, he either did not know, or had refused to know, about Meenie's lamentable conduct. On this one point he was hopelessly perverse; he never would listen to anything said against this daughter of his; Meenie was always in the right—no matter what it was. And so, notwithstanding that she had been sent home as one in disgrace, and had been received as one in disgrace, she installed herself as her father's nurse with an amazing self-content; and she brought him his beef-tea and port-wine at the stated intervals (for the good Doctor did not seem to have as much faith in drugs as might have been anticipated); and she kept the peat-fire piled up and blazing; and she methodically read to him the Inverness Courier, the Glasgow Weekly Citizen, and the Edinburgh Scotsman; and when these were done she would get out a volume of old ballads, or perhaps 'The Eve of St. Agnes,' or 'Esmond,' or 'As You Like It,' or the 'Winter's Tale.' It did not matter much to him what she read; he liked to hear the sound of Meenie's voice—in this hushed, half-slumberous, warm little room, while the chill north winds howled without, chasing each other across the driven loch, and sighing and sobbing away along the lonely Strath-Terry.

But on this fair morning there was not a breath stirring; and the curving bays and promontories and birch-woods, and the far hills beyond, were all reflected in the magic mirror of the lake, as she sped along the highway, making for the Clebrig slopes. And soon she was mounting these—with the light step of one trained to the heather; and ever as she got higher and higher the vast panorama around her grew wider and more wide, until she could see hills and lochs and wooded islands that never were visible from Inver-Mudal. In the perfect silence, the sudden whirr of a startled grouse made her heart jump. A hare—that looked remarkably like a cat, for there was as much white as bluish-brown about it—got up almost at her feet and sped swiftly away over heath and rock until it disappeared in one of the numerous peat-hags. There was a solitary eagle slowly circling in the blue; but at so great a height that it was but a speck. At one moment she thought she had caught sight of the antlers of a stag; and for a second she stopped short, rather frightened; but presently she had convinced herself that these were but two bits of withered birch, appearing over the edge of a rock far above her. It was a little chillier here; but the brisk exercise kept her warm. And still she toiled on and on; until she knew, or guessed, that she was high enough; and now the question was to discover the whereabouts of the clump of rocks under shelter of which Ronald was accustomed to sit, when he had been up here alone, dreaming day-dreams, and scribbling the foolish rhymes that had won to her favour, whatever he might think of them.

At first this seemed a hopeless task; for the whole place was a wilderness of moss and heather and peat-hags, with scarcely a distinctive feature anywhere. But she wandered about, watching the little terrier covertly; and at last she saw him put his nose in an inquiring way into a hole underneath some tumbled boulders. He turned and looked at her; she followed. And now there could be no doubt that this was Ronald's halting-place and pulpit of meditation; for she forthwith discovered the hidden case at the back of the little cave—though the key of that now belonged to his successor. And so, in much content, she sate herself down on the heather; with all the wide, sunlit, still world mapped out before her—the silver thread of Mudal Water visible here and there among the moors, and Loch Meadie with its islands, and Ben Hope and Ben Loyal, and Bonnie Strath-Naver, and the far Kyle of Tongue close to the northern Sea.

Now, what had Love Meenie climbed all this height for? what but to read herself back into the time when Ronald used to come here alone; and to think of what he had been thinking; and to picture herself as still an unconscious maiden wandering about that distant little hamlet that seemed but two or three dots down there among the trees. This, or something like it, has always been a favourite pastime with lovers; but Meenie had an additional source of interest in the possession of a packet of those idle rhymes, and these were a kind of key to bygone moods and days. And so it was here—in this strange stillness—that Ronald had written these verses about her; and perhaps caught a glimpse of her, with his telescope, as she came out from the cottage to intercept the mail; when little indeed was she dreaming that he had any such fancies in his head. And now as she turned over page after page, sometimes she laughed a little, when she came to something that seemed a trifle audacious—and she scarcely wondered that he had been afraid of her seeing such bold declarations: and then again a kind of compunction filled her heart; and she wished that Ronald had not praised her so; for what had she done to deserve it; and how would her coming life be made to correspond with these all too generous and exalted estimates of her character? Of course she liked well enough to come upon praises of her abundant brown hair, and her Highland eyes, and the rose-leaf tint of her cheeks, and the lightness of her step; for she was aware of these things as well as he; and glad enough that she possessed them, for had they not commended her to him? But as for these other wonderful graces of mind and disposition with which he had adorned her? She was sadly afraid that he would find her stupid, ill-instructed, unread, fractious, unreasonable, incapable of understanding him. Look, for example, how he could imbue these hills and moors and vales with a kind of magic, so that they seemed to become his personal friends. To her they were all dead things (except Mudal Water, at times, on the summer evenings), but to him they seemed instinct with life. They spoke to him; and he to them; he understood them; they were his companions and friends; who but himself could tell of what this very hill of Clebrig was thinking?—

Ben Clebrig's a blaze of splendour

In the first red flush of the morn,