Chapter XVII: Lochfyne

"It is Eden: it is the Garden of the Lord!" said the Minister; and the sad and sunken eyes that had grown dim over many books--that had grown weary, too, perhaps, with the bleakness of the upland moor--looked abroad over one of the fairest scenes in the world, and drank in the quiet and the dear sunshine of it. Far in front of him stretched the pale-blue plain of Lochfyne, that was as still, and smooth, and motionless as the pale-blue sky above. From this point of the Knapdale coast away up to the fork of Loch Gilp there was not a ripple on the calm surface; but over at the opposite shore a slight breeze was bearing up from the south, and there the blue of the water was intense and almost dark. Beyond this azure plain lay the brown and ruddy colours of the Cowal hills--soft and smooth in the mist of the heat; while along them moved great dashes of shadow thrown by the slowly-passing clouds above. Through the stillness of the sunshine they heard the soft whistle of the curlew; they saw the solan flap his heavy white wings far down towards Arran; they watched the solitary heron standing among the brown weeds out at the point of the shore--while now and again a sea-trout would leap a foot into the air, and fall with a splash again into the clear water. Then all around them, where they sat on the pebbly beach, was the drowsy warmth of the sun--glittering sharply on the birch and hazel bushes by the road--gleaming more softly on the great grey boulders--and dwelling mistily on the bushes, and heather, and rocks of the hill-side. And all this was so still that it scarcely seemed to be of this world; the murmur of a stream coming down through the trees--trickling coolly and unseen beneath the tall ferns--had a far and mournful sound, like the sound of distant music in a dream.

The silence was broken by Coquette trying to whistle "The Last Rose of Summer." Then she uttered a little cry of delight as she saw Lord Earlshope and Lady Drum coming along the road underneath the trees; and when at length they had drawn near and had come down to the shore, Coquette said--

"Please, Lady Drum, will you tell me why my uncle becomes sad when he sees a pretty day and a pretty place. The good weather does not cheer him----"

"It cheers you, at all events," said Lady Drum, with a kindly scrutiny of the girl's face. "It gives you a colour and a brightness that makes an old woman like me feel young again only to look at ye. How have you been employing yourself?"

"I? I have been trying to whistle as my cousin whistles, but I cannot do it like him, perhaps because I have no pockets. He never is able to whistle unless he puts his hands in his pockets, and looks careless, and stands so! Then I have watched the grey heron out at the rocks there, and I have been wishing he would get a fish."

"I have been wishing I had a gun," said the practical Whaup, with obvious discontent.

"And my uncle--he has been sitting and looking far away--looking tired, too, and weary--just as if he were still in church."

"Listening to one of my own sermons, I suppose?" said the Minister, taking his niece by the ear. "I hope I have not been oppressing you with my dulness?"

"Ah, no, no!" she said. "But I did not speak to you; you were thinking of old years gone away, were you not?"

The Minister looked at the girl: her eyes seemed to have divined what he was thinking of. But presently she turned to Lord Earlshope, and said--

"We go not to-day? We do not perhaps to-morrow either?"

"Why," said Lord Earlshope, with a smile, "you might turn your newest accomplishment to some use. Could you whistle a breeze to us? We are helpless, you see, until we get wind."

"I thought an English milord never wanted for anything that he did not get," she said, with a glance of grave surprise.

The Whaup began to think that his cousin was a deal too clever to be safe.

"Would it grieve you so much to stay a few days here?" said Lord Earlshope.

"Not at all," said Coquette; "I should prefer to stay here always."

"I have had the yacht taken round to Maol-Daroch Bay--that little shingly creek south of the harbour--since you spoke of the smell of the fishing-nets this morning. And when you wish to go into the village you must ask the captain to send you round in a boat. By the way, the gig will be here presently. I thought you might be too tired to care about walking back."

"It was very kind of you to think of all that," said Coquette, timidly, and looking to the ground.

It had already come to be regarded as a matter of course that everybody should consider Coquette as of first importance, and obey her slightest whim, and anticipate her smallest wishes. But the most systematic and persistent of her slaves was Earlshope himself, who seemed to have discovered a new method of passing the time in trying to please this young person by small attentions; and these he offered in a friendly and familiar way which robbed them of any significance they might otherwise have had. The small tyrant, with the dark eyes, and the delicate, finely-formed face, accepted these ministrations in that spirit of careless amiability which was natural to her. Sometimes--but rarely--she would appear to be struck by this or that act of kindness, and seem almost disturbed that she could not convey a sense of her gratitude in the broken tongue she spoke; but ordinarily she passed from hour to hour in the same happy unconsciousness and delight in the present--glad that all her friends were around her, and comfortable--glad that she could add to their enjoyment by being cheerful and merry. Selfish she certainly was not; and there was no sort of trouble or pain she would not have endured to give pleasure to those who were her friends; but she would have been blind indeed had she not perceived that to give pleasure she had only to allow herself to be pleased--that her mere presence diffused a sense of satisfaction through the small meetings that were held in the saloon of the yacht, when the swinging lamps were lit, and the stars overhead shut out, and the amusements of the evening begun. The Whaup used to say that she was continually making pretty pictures; and he even condescended at times to express approval of the neatness of her dress, or to suggest alterations in the disposal of her big masses of dark-brown hair.

"And in time, you know," he remarked to her, "you will get to talk like other people."

"I do not wish to talk like you," said Coquette.

"I can at least make myself intelligible," he retorted.

"Do not I become intelligible?" asked Coquette, meekly; and then, of course, the least symptom of doubt on her part disarmed the Whaup's criticism, and made him declare that she spoke very well indeed.

The measured splash of oars was now heard; and the heron slowly rose into the air with a few heavy flaps of his wings, and proceeded to settle on a farther promontory. The gig, with its four rowers, came round the point; and in a few minutes the heavily-laden boat was on its way back to the yacht.

Coquette was delighted with Maol-Daroch Bay; she insisted upon landing at once; and she and the Whaup accordingly ran up the white shingle, and made for the hill-side. Coquette stood upon a rock that was perched high among the heathery roughnesses of the hill, and waved her handkerchief to those who had by this time gone on board the yacht. Lord Earlshope answered with his cap, and Mr. Cassilis with his walking-stick; Lady Drum had gone below.

"Now we shall go up this hill, and round, and down, and back by the rocks of the shore," said Coquette.

"What's the use?" said the Whaup. "I haven't a gun; and if I had, I daren't shoot up here."

"Why must you kill something wherever you go?" said Coquette.

"Why must you scramble along a hill, all for nothing, like a goat?" demanded the Whaup.

"Because it is something to do," answered Coquette.

"You are a pretty invalid!" remarked the Whaup. "But here, give me your hand--if you want climbing, I'll give you enough of it."

"No," said Coquette, planting her foot firmly. "I like you when you are gentle, like Lord Earlshope; but I am not going to be pulled by a big rough boy."

"I have a great mind to carry you against your will," said the Whaup, a demon of mischief beginning to laugh in his eyes.

"I would kill you if you tried!" said Coquette, with a sudden frown.

He came forward and took her hand quite gently.

"Have I vexed you? Are you really angry, Coquette? You didn't think I was serious, did you? You know I wouldn't vex you, if I got the world for it."

A certain quivering of the lip, for a moment uncertain, resolved itself into a smile--and that into a laugh--and then Coquette said--

"You are a very good boy, Tom, when you like. Some one will be very fond of you some day."

The Whaup grew more serious then; and, indeed, it seemed to Coquette that ever after that time her cousin's manner towards her was more reserved and grave than it had been before. He did not try to drag her into his boyish pranks, as he had been wont to do. On the contrary, he himself seemed somewhat altered: and at times she caught him in a deep reverie. He began to talk more about his coming winter studies at the Glasgow University; and was even found, on rare occasions, absorbed in a book.

He did not cease to exhibit those frank and manly ways which she had always liked; nor did he even put any marked restraint on his relations with her. He was as impertinently straightforward as ever, if the neatness of her wristbands called for commendation, or if the streak of dark blue ribbon did not sufficiently curb the wildness of her hair. But he was more serious in his ways; and sometimes she caught him looking at her from a distance, in a cold way, as if she were a stranger, and he was desirous to impress her appearance on his memory.

That evening he said to her briefly--

"Lord Earlshope and I are going to start at two to-morrow morning to go along the coast and see if we can shoot some seals."

"But why should you take trouble to kill them? Is it a pleasure to kill them?"

"Bah!" he said. "Women don't understand these things. You wouldn't hear a man ask such a question--except, perhaps, Earlshope himself--he might--he seems to think in lots of things exactly as you do."

This was said with no particular intention; and yet the girl looked apprehensive as though the Whaup had been making some complaint.

Then some time after, he remarked to her--

"I don't think wicked people seem so wicked when you come to know them."

Coquette was looking over the taffrail; she turned towards him and said calmly--

"Do you mean me or Lord Earlshope?"

"Why should you always think of him?" said the Whaup. "Would you be very angry if what I said applied to both of you?"

With that he laughed and walked away, leaving Coquette to wonder whether her cousin, too, regarded her as a wicked person.