Chapter XIX: Sporting-Time in Woods and Wilds

The storm that imprisoned Antony's caravans will long be remembered in the Scottish Highlands for its renewal day after day for more than a week. Blizzard after blizzard blew, and even at last, when the snow ceased to fall and the sun brought a return of fine weather, winter held its tight grip upon everything. The roads were impassable, and for a time even snow-ploughs had but little effect upon the mighty wreaths and banks. But worse than these banks were the filled-up hollows and ravines in which some people averred it would take months to melt the snow.

Antony was a hopeful young fellow, however; and though a month in his snow-prison might not have hurt, he thought that in three months things would become a trifle monotonous, especially as they were a long journey from the camp of Biffins Lee. He need not have feared starvation, however, nor loneliness either, for when the sun began to shine once more he had many visitors who had made long pilgrimages to see the snow-bound camp and caravans. There were small lochs about moreover; and to one of these, in spite of the heavy walking, Antony and his little companion made frequent journeys. Both had skates and both knew well how to use them. Antony, however, had made one mistake: he had imagined he could show the northerners a thing or two, as he slanged it. It was quite the other way, for the northerners have practice almost all the winter through, and are therefore very expert at skating.

But on the ice, whether curling or skating, Antony could not help making acquaintance with some very nice people; and though at heart neither a hermit nor recluse--because, as he explained only to his sister Aggie, society bored him--he was not proof against some of the many kind invitations he received from really good families. The roads now were passable in most parts to light dogcarts and to sleighs, although the 'Gipsy Queen' dared not attempt them. He tried to stave off some of these invitations by saying that he could not leave his housekeeper and Lotty in the evening. But there was an easy answer to this objection.

'Let your big, beautiful dog stay with the caravan, and also your groom. These can protect your housekeeper, and you bring the child with you.'

Well, there was moonlight at present, and really--under a clear, star-studded sky, with hard snow under the runners and jingling bells at the horse's neck--sleighing, well wrapped up in warm furs, is a very delightful sensation, and Lotty enjoyed it immensely. Perhaps she enjoyed quite as much a ride in a swift motor-car, and some families had these, and they seemed to run along where the roads were open at about a hundred miles an hour, although they might have been doing barely forty. And wherever she went Lotty took her violin with her, so that it is no wonder this infant prodigy was an immense favourite. The verdict on her was very much the same wherever she went: 'So gentle and well-behaved, so lady-like, and so unlike all one's conceived ideas of a show-child.' For, of course, Antony had thought proper not to conceal what Lotty really was--just a little gipsy lass.

But there was one thing which probably accounted in some measure for Lotty's nice manners. Biffins Lee had not neglected her education; and this not out of any real kindness to the child, we may well believe, but because his desire was to have her an infant prodigy in every way possible. At places where a sojourn was determined upon, if of only a few weeks' duration, Biffins had seen to it that she had the best of teaching from the best of teachers in every branch of education that would tend to bring out her brightest qualities. Little wanderer though she was, Lotty loved knowledge, and learning was a delight to her. Everything taught her fell upon the best soil and took root, therefore rendering her mind not the barren and inhospitable desert we too often find it in children, who seem to regard teaching and education of all kinds as penal, as a kind of punishment from which they long to emerge and speedily forget.

Lotty knew English well, and so she read the best of English authors old and new, and her knowledge of French was the key that opened to her the doors of a great library which was stored with marvels.

And whenever Biffins had the chance he was fond of drawing Lotty out before people to show how much his child--he always put great emphasis on the possessive pronoun--knew.

With music it was the same. But, after all, her accomplishments were all meant to bring grist to his own mill and make Lotty more valuable as a property.

At one house a children's party was got up all for Lotty's own sake, and the little ones who met her were kept laughing at all her marvellous tricks till long past their usual bedtime.

So, upon the whole, being snow-bound in a caravan in the dead of winter Antony found was not such a terrible experience after all. He kept in touch with Biffins Lee, but only by telegrams, and these were just as brief as he could make them, and few and far between. One ran thus: 'Storm-stayed;' another, 'Snow-bound;' a third, 'Still snow-bound,' and so on and so forth. He took the trouble to prepay these, and the replies were always consoling enough: 'Don't hurry--all right in camp;' or 'Keep my properties as long as you have a mind.'

While storm-stayed among the beautiful snow, with pure air blowing around him, and the scenery of mountain, forest, and stream so fairy-like and enchanting, Antony could not help thinking of the kind of life that his father had half-recommended to him--namely, that of London. Comparisons are odious, it is true; still, for once in a way, Antony could not help making them.

'Frank Antony Blake,' he said to himself, 'I will tell you something, but you are never to let it go any farther. All around you here there are beauty and romance that nothing on earth could surpass, while yonder in the city are the black mire of muddy streets, bare trees dripping soot, darkness, and choking fog. Frank Antony Blake, you have the better of it, you lucky old dog!'

He had frequent letters from Manby Hall, from Aggie, for she was the only real scribe; and almost every one of these now breathed the wish that he might soon return. Antony's mother wrote but seldom, being very much of an invalid and taking but little interest in anything.

'Still frozen in,' he said in a telegram to Aggie.

Well, there were sports in winter here that were not to be despised, and one of these was white hare shooting. Antony thought himself fit, and he was fairly so; but he found that a twenty-mile walk over the mountains after these Alpine hares, and the same distance back, was trying to his heart as well as to his legs. Yet the sturdy fellows who went with him, and the hardy Highland keepers, thought nothing of it. One day in particular he felt so tired when nearing home that he scarce could carry his gun; but very much surprised was he to be told by a keeper that he was going to walk five miles to a ball as soon as he changed his kilt, and would no doubt dance all night and go to the hill after breakfast in the morning.

Heigh-ho! pleasure of every kind comes to an end in this world, and sooner or later the world itself will come to an end. So, after innumerable adventures on the road, Antony with his caravans found himself one forenoon rolling into Biffins Lee's camp once more. But never, never could he forget the joys and romance of that winter tour in the Highlands. All hands gathered round to hear them tell their story, and everybody was pleased to see them back once more safe and sound.

Although the real home of a dog is wherever his master or mistress is, still no one nowadays would be listened to who disputed the fact that the honest fellow thinks and remembers, and that he can no more forget the days of auld langsyne than can a human being. Indeed, on his return Wallace's behaviour was very human. He not only went a round of inspection all about the camp, as if to see that everything was as before; but he must say, 'How do you do?' in his own way to every animal in the show, especially Bruin the bear, whom doubtless Wallace looked upon as a hero. But Bruin was very glad to see him, and proved this by actually getting on his hind-legs and performing a wild dance of his own which would have looked very ridiculous had he not been so really sincere.

The springtime had commenced--that is, it was the middle of February, and this is Nature's spring, let astronomers rule it otherwise if they please. But the buds that had first shown life in November by thrusting off the old leaves, that fell withered and brown on pathway and bank, showed signs now of fullness and bursting. They but waited in silence for balmier breezes to blow and for the sun to shine more warmly at midday. Then the coy young leaflets would begin to show. On banks beneath the rocky cliffs and on old gray boulders the velvety moss assumed a brighter face, and wee olive-leaves appeared on the honeysuckle, which is ever the first to give show of life to wild hedge or copse.

Away in the woods the hoodies were building a nest here and a nest there in pine-tree or tall elm, for they are not social birds. These worked in silence; but high in the larches the magpies made more din and chattering.

Birds of all kinds were more gaily dressed now to welcome the incoming season of joy and love. The mavises and blackbirds sang loud and jubilant in the plantation's shade; they wanted all the world to know that they were happy. But even the tinier birds, songless as yet, that hopped from tree to tree, looked very busy and vastly important, for each little feathered bosom held a sweet secret that none but themselves should know.

The sea-birds came as usual to the knoll to be fed; but even their plumage looked cleaner, if that could have been possible, and more ornate. They were quicker on the wing too, and their voices were shriller and more musical. By the highway sides anemones began now to snow the turf, and many a little nameless yellow flower, and the gowans or mountain daisies spread wide their crimson-tipped petals to woo the sunshine.

To be out of doors at this season, in this romantic and beautiful sea-laved land, was heaven itself, a happy, hopeful time that Frank Antony, with his big poetic heart, could have wished would last for aye. It was better far, he thought, than the red rush of summer, with its floral glory that would end so soon in autumn brown and sear. But some hearts are built to love spring and only spring. They want to have the buds and flowers always springing, and birds singing their first and therefore their real songs of happiness and love.

Lotty would be thirteen this year.

'Dear me,' she said looking additionally wise for a moment, 'what a long, long life!'

Poor little gipsy lass, that long, long life had not been wanting in sorrow! And it was probably for this reason that it seemed to her so long.

They were bird-nesting among the yellow gorse that scented all the air around them and hugged the moorland in great golden patches; and it was here the rose-linnet had its cosy nest and sang so sweetly to its little brown mate so quiet on her speckled eggs. Both Antony and she loved to see birds' nests, but it is needless to say they touched them not.

'I'll soon be old, Mr Blake!'

Her companion laughed; and Wallace, fancying he saw the joke, gave Lotty's ear a friendly lick in passing.

'Soon be as old as Crona, won't you, dear?' said Antony.

'Oh, I don't know how long it takes to be as old as Crona, though somehow I never think that my fairy godmother is aged.'

'You are a happy girl to have so good a godmother.'

'Oh yes, and I feel cold sometimes to think how miserable I would be if there were no Crona. I have Chops--Chops comes next after Wallace; and then Mary, and then Bruin, and then Skeleton.'

'You put Bruin before Skeleton?'

'Yes, Bruin before Skeleton; because I've seen more of him, you know--more of Bruin than even Wallace, though Wallace is wiser. But, Mr Blake, I can remember a time when there was no Wallace, and then it was always either Chops or Bruin who came with me when I went to visit Crona. But I was never afraid of ugly men when Bruin was with me.'

'I should think not indeed.'

'And once, I mind, it came on too quickly dark in the forest--that was before Chops had blazed the trees--and I lost myself. The bear and I soon grew tired and lay down to rest. I would have been very cold if Bruin hadn't been so warm, so I soon fell sound asleep.'

'A very pretty pair of babes in the wood you must have looked!'

'It was very early when I awoke, but quite light, and I was so dreadfully afraid now, because Bruin was sitting and roaring loud and angry. Will Wisely the poacher was standing there not far off, and shaking with fear so that he could hardly speak.

'"Oh Will," I cried, "get up into a tree for fear Bruin kills you and eats you."

'It was a very tall, close spruce-tree, and up went Will as quickly as he could. I thought Bruin would not follow; but he did, because Bruin, I'm sure, believed that all the forest belonged to him and me, and that Will Wisely had no business up in one of our trees. So the bear roared more loudly than ever, and went off up the tree, and then Will was forced to slide out over the point of a big branch and lower himself to the ground.

'"Run, Will," I said, "run, Will, for your life, and I'll try to keep Bruin in the tree."

'So I climbed up a bit myself, and the bear growled and was very angry because I wouldn't let him down to get a piece of Will Wisely. But I wouldn't, and so Will got away, and Bruin and I soon found our way home to camp. Oh, I love Bruin! And, Mr Blake, when you go away'----

The child suddenly stopped speaking, and, to Antony's surprise, threw herself on the ground close beside the golden furze there, where the rose-linnets sang, and burst into a fit of sobbing and tears.