Donald Ross of Heimra (Volume 2 of 3)

CHAPTER IV
HER GUEST

"It will be all different now," said Käthchen, one evening, when they were come to within a week of the arrival of Mary's brother and his friend Frank Meredyth. "And you deserve some little rest, Mamie, and some little amusement, after all your hard work. And I want you to be considerate – towards Mr. Meredyth, I mean. It isn't merely grouse and grilse that are bringing him here. You know what your brother says – that there is no one in such request for shooting parties; he could just have his pick of invitations, all over Scotland, every autumn; so you may be sure it isn't merely for the grouse and the salmon-fishing he is coming to a little place like Lochgarra. Oh, you need not pretend to deny it, Mamie! And all I want is that you should be a little considerate. He may be very anxious to have you, and yet not quite so anxious to take over your hobby as well. He may not even be interested in the price of home-knitted stockings."

Mary Stanley did not answer just at once. The two girls were slowly walking up and down the stone terrace outside the house. It was ten o'clock at night; but it was not yet dark, nor anything approaching to dark. All the world was of a pale, clear, wan lilac colour: and in this coldly luminous twilight any white object – the front of a cottage, for example, or the little Free Church building across the bay – appeared startlingly distinct. There was an absolute silence; the sea was still; two hours ago the sun had gone down behind what seemed a vast and motionless lake of molten copper; and now there was a far-reaching expanse of pearly grey, with the long headlands and Eilean Heimra gathering shadows around them. The heavens were cloudless and serene; over the sombre hills in the east a star throbbed here and there, but it had to be sought for. There appeared to be neither lamp nor candle down in the village – there was no need of them on these magical summer nights.

"I do not see that it will be so different," said Mary, presently. "Fred will have to look after Mr. Meredyth. No doubt there will be something of a commotion in so quiet a place – the dogs, and keepers, and ponies; by the way, there will be gillies wanted for the fishing as well as for the shooting later on – "

Käthchen began to snigger a little.

"I do believe, Mamie," she said, "that that is all the interest you have in the shooting – it will provide so much more employment for your beloved crofters."

"Oh, yes, I suppose the place will be a little more brisk and lively," Mary continued, "though that won't improve it much in my estimation. I wonder what made Fred hire that wretched little steam-launch." She looked towards the tiny vessel that was lying close to the quay: the small white funnel and the decks forward were visible in the mystic twilight; the hull was less clearly defined. "Fancy that thing coming sputtering and crackling into the bay on a beautiful night like this!"

"It would be very handy to take a message out to Heimra Island," said Käthchen, demurely.

Mary glanced at her, and laughed.

"My dear Käthchen, curiosity is a humiliating weakness; but I will tell you what is in the letter that is lying on the hall table – and that is likely to lie there, unless a wind springs up from some quarter to-morrow. It is an invitation to Mr. Ross to come and dine with us on Monday next."

"Monday?" said Kate Glendinning, looking surprised. "The very day your brother and Mr. Meredyth come here?"

"For that very reason," said Mary. "I wish Mr. Ross to understand why we have never asked him to dine with us – well, of course he would understand for himself – two girls, living by themselves – and – and knowing him only for so short a time. But now, you see, I ask him for the very first evening that my brother is in the house – and that's all right and correct – if there's any Mrs. Grundy in Lochgarra."

"The Free Church Minister!" said Käthchen, spitefully – for she had never forgiven the good man for his having kept aloof from the fray at Ru-Minard.

"Mr. Ross has been very kind to me – in his reserved and distant way," Mary said, "and I should not like him to think me ungrateful – "

"He cannot do that," said Käthchen, "if he hasn't been blind to what your eyes have said to him again and again."

"What do you mean, Käthchen?" Mary demanded – at once alarmed and resentful.

Käthchen retreated quickly: it had been a careless remark.

"Oh, I don't mean anything. I mean your eyes have said 'Thank you,' again and again; and it is but right they should. He has indeed been very thoughtful and kind – and always so respectful – keeping himself in the background. Oh, you need not be afraid, Mamie: you won't find me suggesting that you shouldn't have the most frank and friendly relations with Mr. Ross. At the same time – "

"Yes, at the same time?"

"I was wondering," said Käthchen, with a little hesitation, "how he might get on with your brother and Mr. Meredyth – or, rather, how they might get on with him – "

"My brother and Mr. Meredyth," said Mary, a little proudly, "will remember that Mr. Ross is my guest: that will be enough."

But Kate Glendinning's uneasy forecast was not without some justification – as Mary was soon to discover. The two visitors from the South arrived on the Monday afternoon, and there were many curious eyes covertly following the waggonette as it drove through the village. Of the two strangers, the taller, who was Mary Stanley's brother, was a young fellow of about four or five-and-twenty, good looking rather, of the fair English type, with an aquiline nose, a pretty little yellow-white moustache, and calm grey eyes. His companion, some eight or ten years older, was of middle height, or perhaps a trifle under, active and wiry-looking, with a sun-tanned face, a firm mouth, and shrewd eyes, that on the whole were also good-natured. Both of the travellers were in high spirits – and no wonder: they had heard good accounts of the grouse; they had just caught a glimpse of the Garra, which had plenty of water after the recent rains; over there was the little steam launch that could amuse them now and again for an idle hour; and beyond the bay the big, odd-looking house, against its background of fir and larch, seemed to offer them a hospitable welcome.

Mary was at the top of the semicircular flight of stairs to greet them; but even as she accompanied them into the great oak hall she instinctively felt that there was something unusual in her brother's manner towards her. And when, presently, Mr. Meredyth had been taken away to be shown his own room, Fred Stanley remained behind: Käthchen had not yet put in an appearance, for some reason or another.

"Well, what's the matter, Fred?" Mary said at once.

He had been kicking about the drawing-room in a discontented fashion, staring out of the windows or glancing at the engravings while his friend was there; but now these two were alone.

"The matter?" said he. "Plenty the matter! I don't like to find that you have been making a fool of yourself, and that you are still bent on making a fool of yourself."

"But we can't help it if we are born that way," she said, sweetly.

"Oh, you know quite well what I mean," said this tall young gentleman with the boyish moustache. "I had heard something of it before; but I thought we might as well stop the night at Inverness on the way north; and I saw Mr. Purdie. Now, mind you, Mamie, don't you take it into your head that Purdie said anything against you – he did not. He's a shrewd-headed fellow, and knows which side his bread is buttered. But he answered my questions. And I find you have just been ruining this place – turning the whole neighbourhood into a pauper asylum – and – and flinging the thing away, as you might call it."

"But it wasn't left to you, Fred," she reminded him, gently. "And I have been doing my best – after inquiry."

"Oh, I know," he said impatiently; "you've been got at by a lot of sentimentalists in London – faddists – slummers – popularity-hunters; and now, here in the Highlands, you have been working into the hands of those agitator fellows who are trying to stir up anarchy and rebellion everywhere; and you let yourself be imposed upon by a parcel of scheming and cunning crofters, who don't thank you, to begin with, and who would pull down this house to the ground and burn it the moment your back was turned if they dared."

"You haven't been very long in Lochgarra," said she, with much good humour, "but you seem to have used your time industriously. You know all about it – "

"Oh, it isn't only this place!" he said. "Everyone who reads the papers – who knows anything of the Highlands – is aware of what is going on. And you have allowed yourself to be taken in! For the credit of the family – for the sake of your own common sense – you might have waited a little. Here was Mr. Purdie, who knew the place, who knew the people; but you must needs take the whole matter in your own hands, and begin to throw away your money right and left, as if you had come into a dukedom! What do you suppose is the rental now – after all your abatements?"

"Well, I don't exactly know," said she. "But isn't it better to take what the people can really give you than nothing at all? You can't live on arrears? And, my dear Fred, what cause have you to grumble? The amount of rent affects me only; whereas I offer you the shooting and fishing, which has nothing to do with these matters. Why can't you amuse yourself and let me alone? What I have done I have considered. I have inquired into the condition of these people. To make rents practicable is not to throw away money. Indeed – but I am not going to discuss the question with you at all. Go away and get out your fly-book, and take Mr. Meredyth down to the Garra, and see if you can pick up a grilse before dinner."

But he was not to be put off by her bland amiability.

"Of course," said he, "it is very kind of you to offer me the fishing and the shooting; but I should have been better pleased to have had them without encumbrances."

"What do you mean?" said she.

"Why, who has the fishing and shooting here?" said he. "This poaching scoundrel, Ross. I am told the whole place is in league with him. He can do what he likes."

"And what further information did you gather at Inverness?" she asked, rather contemptuously.

"Well, but look here, Mamie," he remonstrated, with a sense of his wrongs gaining upon him. "Consider the position you have put me in. You know how Frank is in request at this time of the year – a thundering good shot – and used to managing things about country-houses – "

"As well as leading cotillons in London," she interposed, with smiling eyes.

"And why not?" said he, boldly. "Oh, I suppose you consider that effeminate: you would rather have him living among rocks and caves, like this smuggling fellow, and shooting seagulls for his dinner? However, look at my position. I ask him to come down with me, at your suggestion. I tell him it isn't a grand shooting – and that he'll get more sea-trout than salmon in the river – but he comes all the same; and then we discover that the whole place is at the mercy of this idling blackguard of a fellow – if we get a few birds or find a pool undisturbed, it is with his sufferance – "

"So you have acquired all this information at Inverness?" said she. "But I wouldn't entirely trust it if I were you. I am afraid Mr. Purdie is rather prejudiced. He may have been exaggerating. However, if there is any truth in what he says, I'll tell you what you ought to do: ask Mr. Ross to join your shooting and fishing parties. You'll meet him to-night at dinner."

"Here – in this house?" he exclaimed, jumping to his feet. "Mamie, are you mad?"

"I hope not," she said quietly. "But Mr. Ross has been very kind to me of late, in helping me in various little ways; and as I couldn't well ask him to dinner when only Kate and I were in the house, I took the first opportunity after your arrival – "

"And so Frank and I, after being warned that the great annoyance and vexation we should find in the place is this fellow Ross, are coolly informed that we are to meet him at dinner, and I suppose we are expected to be civil to him!"

"I certainly do expect you to be civil to him," said Mary.

"Oh, but it's too bad!" he said, impatiently, and he went to the window and turned his back on her. And then he faced round again. "I wonder what Frank will think! I was almost ashamed to ask him to come here, even as it was – a small shooting, not much fishing, and the stalking merely a chance; but, all the same, he accepts; then the first thing we hear of on reaching Inverness is all about this vexation and underhand going on; and the next thing is that we are asked to meet at dinner the very person who causes all the trouble! Now, Mamie, I appeal to yourself, don't you think it is a little too hard?"

She hesitated. She began to fear she had been thoughtless – indiscreet – too much taken up with her own plans and projects.

"At all events, Fred," she pleaded, "your meeting Mr. Ross at dinner can't matter one way or the other – and you will be able to judge for yourself. To me he does not seem the kind of young man you would suspect of spending his time in poaching; in fact, as I understand it, he is looking forward to being called to the Bar, and I should think he was busier with books than with cartridges or salmon flies."

"You are sure he said he would come to-night?" asked this young Fred Stanley, looking at his sister.

"Yes."

"Definitely promised?"

"Yes."

"Well, I don't think he will."

"Why?"

"Because," said the young man, as he went leisurely towards the door, "there might be a question of evening dress. You haven't a Court tailor at Lochgarra, have you?"

Mary flushed slightly.

"I don't care whether he appears in evening dress or not," said she. "Most likely he will come along from his yacht; and a yachting suit is as good as any – in my eyes."

That evening, when the young hostess came downstairs, the large drawing-room was all suffused with a soft warmth of colour, for the sun was just sinking behind the violet-grey Atlantic, and the glory of the western skies streamed in through the several windows. Käthchen was here; and Käthchen's eyes lighted up with pleasure when she saw how Mary was attired. And yet could any costume have been simpler than this dress of cream-coloured China silk, its only ornamentation being a bunch of deep crimson fuchsias at the opening of the bodice, with another cluster of the same flowers at her belt? She wore no jewellery of any kind whatsoever.

"That is more like you, Mamie," said Käthchen, coming forward with a proud and admiring scrutiny. "I want Mr. Ross to see you in something different from your ordinary workaday things. And you look taller, too, somehow. And fairer – or is that the light from the windows?"

At this very moment the door was opened, and Mr. Ross was announced. Mary turned – with some little self-conscious expectation. And here was Young Donald of Heimra, in faultless evening dress; and there was a quiet look of friendliness in his eyes as he came forward and took the hand that was offered him. Käthchen said to herself: "Why is it that the full shirt-front and white tie suit dark men so well? And why doesn't he dress like that every evening?" For Käthchen did not know that that was precisely what Donald Ross had been in the habit of doing all the years that his mother and he had lived out in that remote island; it was a little compliment he paid her; and she liked that bit of make-believe of ceremony in the monotony of their isolated life.

The new-comers who had arrived that afternoon were somewhat late; for they had gone down to the river to have a cast or two – a futile proceeding in the blazing sunlight; but presently they made their appearance, and were in due course introduced to Donald Ross. Käthchen, who was as usual a keen and interested observer, and who had heard of Fred Stanley's indignant protest, could not but admire the perfect good breeding he displayed on being thus brought face to face with his enemy. But indeed the ordinary every-day manner of a well-educated young Englishman – its curious impassivity, its lack of self-assertion – is a standing puzzle for foreigners and for Americans. What is the origin of it? Blank stupidity? Or a serene contempt for the opinion of others? Or a determination not to commit one's self? Or an affectation of having already seen and done everything worth seeing and doing? Anyhow, Fred Stanley's demeanour towards this stranger and intruder was perfect in its negative way; and so was that of his friend, though Frank Meredyth, by virtue of his superior years, allowed himself to be a little more careless and off-hand. However, there was not much time for forming surmises or jumping to conclusions; for presently dinner was announced.

"Mr. Meredyth, will you take in Miss Glendinning?" Mary said. "Fred, I'm sorry we've nobody for you." And therewithal she turned to Donald Ross, and took his arm, and these two followed the first couple into the dining-room. Young Ross sate at her right hand, of course; he was her chief guest; the others belonged to the house.

It was rather an animated little party; for if the Twelfth was as yet some way off, there were plenty of speculations as to what the Garra was likely to yield in the way of grilse and sea-trout. Käthchen noticed that Donald Ross spoke but little, and that they seldom appealed to him; indeed, Mr. Meredyth, professing to have met with unvarying ill-luck on every stream he had ever fished, was devising an ideal salmon-river on which the sportsman would not be continually exposed to the evil strokes of fate.

"What you want first of all," said he, "is to regulate the water-supply. At present when I go to a salmon-river, one of two things is certain to happen: either it's in roaring flood, and quite unfishable, or else – and this is the more common – it has dwindled away all to nothing, and you might as well begin and throw a fly over a pavement in Piccadilly. Very well; what you want is to turn the mountain-lochs into reservoirs; you bank up the surplus water in the hills; and then, in times of drought, when the river has got low, and would be otherwise unfishable, you send up the keepers to the sluices, turn on a supply, and freshen the pools, so that the fish wake up, and wonder what's going to happen. That is one thing. Then there's another. You know that even when the water is in capital order, you may go down day by day, and find it impossible to get a single cast because of the blazing sunlight. That is a terrible misfortune; for you are all the time aware, as you sit on the bank, and hopelessly watch for clouds, that the fine weather is drying up the hills, and that very soon the stream will have dwindled away again. Very well; what you want for that is en enormous awning, that can be moved from pool to pool, and high enough not to interfere with the casting. By that means, you see, you could transfer any portion of a Highland stream into the land where it is always afternoon; and the fish, thinking the cool of the evening had already come, would begin to disport themselves and play with the pretty little coloured things that the current brought down. Look at the saving of time! Generally, in the middle of the day, there is a horrible long interval when nothing will move in a river. Whether it is the heat, or the sunlight, or the general drowsiness of nature, there's hardly ever anything stirring between twelve o'clock and four; and you lie on the bank, and consume a frightful amount of tobacco; and you may even fall asleep, if you have been doing a good deal of night-work in London. But if you have this great canvas screen, that can be stretched from the trees on one side to the poles on the other – very gradually and slowly, like the coming over of the evening – then the little fishes will begin to say to themselves, 'Here, boys, it's time to go out and have some fun,' and you can have fine sport, in spite of all the sunlight that ever blazed. However, I'm afraid you'd want the revenue of some half-a-dozen dukes before you could secure the ideal salmon-river."

"They're doing so many things with electricity now: couldn't you bring that in?" said Käthchen. "Couldn't you have an electric shock running out from the butt of the rod the moment the salmon touched the fly?"

But this was sheer frivolity. Frank Meredyth suddenly turned to young Ross and said —

"Oh, you can tell me, Mr. Ross – is the Garra a difficult river to fish?"

Now this was a perfectly innocent question – not meant as a trap at all; but Fred Stanley, whose mind had been brooding over the fact that the poacher was actually sitting at table with them, looked startled, and even frightened. Young Ross, on the other hand, appeared in no wise disconcerted.

"Really, I can hardly tell you," he said, "I am not much of a fisherman myself – there is no fishing at all on Heimra Island. But I should say it was not a very difficult river. Perhaps some of the pools under the woods – just above the bridge, I mean, where the banks are steep – might be a little awkward; but further up it is much opener; and further up still you come to long stretches where there isn't a bush on either side."

"Then, perhaps, you can't tell me what are the best sea-trout flies for this water?" was the next question – with no evil intent in it.

"I'm afraid you would find me an untrustworthy guide," said Donald Ross. "If I were you I would take Hector's advice."

So there was an end of this matter – and Fred Stanley was much relieved. What he said to himself was this: "If that Spaniard-looking fellow is lying, he has a splendid nerve and can do it well. A magnificent piece of cheek – if it is so!"

On the whole, at this unpretentious little banquet, Frank Meredyth did most of the talking; and naturally it was addressed in the first place to Miss Stanley as being at the head of the table. He had had a considerable experience of country houses; he was gifted with a certain sense of humour; and he told his stories fairly well – Käthchen rewarding him now and again with a covert little giggle. As for Donald Ross, he sate silent, and reserved, and attentive. He was distinctly the stranger. Not that he betrayed any embarrassment, or was ill at ease; but he seemed to prefer to listen, especially when Mary Stanley happened to be speaking. For, indeed, more than once she let the others go their own way, and turned to him, and engaged him in conversation with herself alone. She found herself timid in doing so. If his manner was always most respectful – and even submissive – his eyes looked uncompromisingly straight at her, and they had a strange, subdued fire in them. When she happened to find his gaze thus fixed on her, she would suddenly grow nervous – stammer – perhaps even forget what she had been saying; while the joyous chatter of the other three at table went gaily on, fortunately for her. Sometimes she would think it was hardly fair of those others to leave her alone in this way: then again she would remind herself that it was she who was responsible for her guest.

It was not that he confused her by an awkward or obstinate silence; on the contrary, he answered her freely enough, in a gravely courteous way; but he seemed to attach too much importance to what she said – he seemed to be too grateful for this special attention she was bestowing upon him. And then again she dared hardly look up; for those black eyes burned so – in a timid, startled way – regarding her as if they would read something behind the mere prettiness of her face and complexion and hair, and apparently quite unconscious of their own power.

At last the ladies rose from the table; and Mary said —

"I suppose you gentlemen will be going out on the terrace to smoke? I wish you would let us come with you. I have not smelt a cigar for months – and it is so delicious in the evening air."

There was not very much objection. Chairs were brought out from the hall; Frank Meredyth perched himself on the stone parapet; the evening air became odorous, for there was hardly a breath of wind coming up from the bay. And as they sate and looked at the wide expanse of water – with only a chance remark breaking the silence from time to time – it may have occurred to one or other of them that the summer twilight that lay over land and sea was growing somewhat warmer in tone. It was Mary who discovered the cause: the golden moon was behind them – just over the low, birch-crowned hill; and the pale radiance lay on the still water in front of them, and on the long spur of land on the other side of the bay, where there were one or two crofters' cottages and fishermen's huts just above the shore. And while they were thus looking abroad over the mystic and sleeping world, a still stranger thing appeared – a more unusual thing for Loch-garra, that is to say – certain moving lights out beyond the point of the headland.

"Look, Mary!" Käthchen cried. "But that can't be the steamer – she is not due till next Thursday!"

Whatever the vessel was, she was obviously making in for the harbour; for presently they could see both port and starboard lights – a red star and a green star, coming slowly into the still, moonlit bay.

"It is the Consuelo," Donald Ross said to Mary. "It is Lord Mount-Grattan's yacht: she has come down from Loch Laxford."

They watched her slow progress – this big dark thing stealing almost noiselessly into the spectral grey world; they saw her gradually rounding; the green light disappeared; there was a sudden noise of the reversal of the screw; then a space of quiet again; and at last the roar of the anchor. The rare visitor had chosen her position for the night.

Almost directly thereafter young Ross of Heimra rose and took leave of his hostess – saying a few words of thanks for so pleasant an evening. The others did not go indoors, however; the still, balmy, moonlight night was too great a temptation. They remained on the terrace, looking at the big black steam-yacht that now lay motionless on the silver-grey water, and listening for the occasional distant sounds that came from it.

But presently they saw a small boat put off from the shore, rowed by two men, with a third figure in the stern.

"That is Mr. Ross!" Käthchen exclaimed. "I know it is – that is his light overcoat."

"Can he be going away in the yacht?" Mary said suddenly.

"Not likely!" her brother struck in. "When you start off on a yachting cruise you don't go on board in evening dress." And then the young man turned to his male companion. "I say, Frank, don't you think that fellow was lying when he pretended not to know anything about the fishing in the Garra?"

It was an idle and careless question – perhaps not even meant to be impertinent; but Mary Stanley flamed up instantly – into white heat.

"Mr. Ross is – is a gentleman," she said, quite breathlessly. "And – he was my guest this evening – though you – you did not seem to treat him as such!"

Käthchen put her hand gently on her friend's arm.

"Mamie!" she said.

And Frank Meredyth never answered the question: this little incident – and a swift and covert glance he had directed towards the young lady herself – had given him something to think about.