Chapter IX: The Messenger

As Malcolm strode up the Glenogle road a little later, well pleased with his day's achievement, he was overtaken by a smart drag and a pair of swift roan horses handled by Drummond of Garrion, whose sister Kitty was by his side.

Neil drew up of course, and there was an odd look on his face as the greeting passed. Malcolm's manner was perfectly cool, even a little defiant. It would certainly have been better had Isla held her tongue, but he was not going to eat humble pie before that big, sheep-faced boy who had nothing but his money to recommend him.

He took off his cap to Kitty, however, who smiled sweetly upon him.

"We're going to Creagh--no, not to call on you, Malcolm, so don't think it. We only wanted to know whether Isla had come back."

"We returned last night," he answered. "Well I'll see you later."

"Nonsense. You'll get up, Mackinnon," said Drummond so shortly that Kitty turned reproachful eyes on him.

There were heaps of stories about Malcolm in the glens, but after all, nothing had been proved against him. And, anyhow, it was not the province of friendship to turn a cold shoulder.

"I'd walk, Malcolm, if I were you. Wait a moment, and I'll get down to convoy you."

"No you don't, my lass," said Drummond firmly. "Get up, Mackinnon. The brutes won't stand--you see how fresh they are."

Malcolm did not hesitate longer. It was three good miles to Creagh yet, and a man doesn't walk so easily after a good meal as before it. He swung himself to the back seat and settled himself so that he could talk to both, but chiefly into the ear of Kitty, whose looks, he decided, had improved.

"Neil's manners, as I dare say you have observed, have not improved of late," said Kitty airily. "He has been such a bear to-day that I am forced to the conclusion that he must have something on his conscience."

Malcolm laughed.

"If it comes to that we've all got something on our consciences--more or less," he answered gaily. "Don't let it put you down on your luck too much, old chap. It's good policy to wait till the clouds roll by."

As to what Neil thought of him Malcolm did not care a fig, but he wished to stand well with Kitty, having proved that women were generally a man's best friends and would champion him, often against their better judgment. It was a favourite jest with him that he would prefer a court martial of women to anything in this world, and that he would never despair of getting off.

Drummond had told his sister only a judicious amount about Achree affairs, and it is to his credit that he had kept the fact of Malcolm's dismissal from the Army entirely to himself even when sometimes tempted to tell what he knew.

It was for Isla's sake that he had kept silence--Isla, whom he loved with a dog-like fidelity that was capable of any sacrifice and any suffering in order to make her happy.

Malcolm was unaware of Drummond's sentiments towards his sister, and if he had known them they would only have amused him. He despised Neil as a man of the world might despise and belittle a boy who had seen nothing of life. Neil, on his part, had the heartiest contempt for Malcolm Mackinnon, and cherished such an honest rage against him that it would have relieved him to have given him a good thrashing.

"You won't like Creagh, Malcolm," said Kitty sympathetically. "I can't help thinking that Isla was in too big a hurry to rush the Americans in. They were so frightfully keen on Achree that they would have waited your time."

"That's what I think, but I don't grumble," said Malcolm. "I've been to lunch with them to-day, and they're quite decent--upon my word they are."

"Been to lunch already, have you, Malcolm? You don't let the grass grow under your feet. And what do you think of them? I really think we must call, Neil. Why not this afternoon when we go down?"

"No," answered Neil shortly, "I'm not needing any truck with such folks. If they must swarm into Scotland, then, let them, but they'll get no encouragement from me."

"Touch me if ye daur," whispered Malcolm with his eyes full of laughter.

Kitty laughed out loud.

On the way down she took the opportunity of asking Neil what had made him so disagreeable to Malcolm all the afternoon.

"I'm sure he's very nice and has greatly improved. His manner to his father is beautiful, I think--such a nice mixture of deference and devotion."

"Fiddlesticks, Kitty!" said Drummond in his grumpiest tones. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Do you?" she asked saucily.

"It takes a man to know a man like Malcolm Mackinnon. I wonder how he can bear to loaf about idle--great big hulking fellow that he is!"

"Loaf about? But he's on leave, Neil, and he has had a hard year of skirmishing. You should hear him tell about it."

"Don't want to--shouldn't believe it if I did," said Neil, biting his lip and conscious that he had very nearly let the cat out of the bag.

He had not had an opportunity of private speech with Isla at Creagh, because he and his sister had found the Edens in the little drawing-room and had left them still there when they went away. The whole afternoon had been a disappointment, and when, as they neared the gate of Achree, Kitty had again ventured to suggest that they should pay a call he refused point-blank.

It seemed as likely as not that Malcolm was to become a bone of contention in the Glen and that very soon there would be two factions--one that believed in him and another that discredited him in everything.

Malcolm himself was the least concerned of them all.

The weather continuing beautiful and spring-like, he went out early and stayed out late, and they saw very little indeed of him at Creagh.

Isla now heard less of the news of the Glen, for it was a long walk down to Lochearn and her father seemed more than ever reluctant to let her out of his sight. These were rather trying days for Isla, because her father talked almost incessantly about Malcolm, praising him to the skies and predicting a glorious future for him.

As the days went by and no letter or communication of any kind came from India or from the War Office, and as no intimation regarding Malcolm's withdrawal from the Army had been seen in any of the newspapers, Isla began to cherish the hope that they had heard the last of it. Of course Malcolm might have intercepted any that had been sent, but if he had done so he did not tell her. They saw little of each other and there was not much brotherly or sisterly confidence between them. They were indeed working at cross-purposes and, without knowing it, each was jealous of the other.

Nobody would have been more surprised and indignant than Isla had anyone told her that she was jealous of Malcolm's frequent visits to Achree: yet that was the truth. Also, she was keenly disappointed that Rosmead, after all his considerate kindness at the beginning, had never made the smallest effort to see her again. She would not go to Achree unless she was specially invited. So she remained at Creagh, living out the dull and narrow days, her heart full of vague discontent and unrest and forebodings which she could not have put into words.

Four weeks passed away--certainly the longest four weeks of Isla's life. She did not like Creagh though nothing on earth would have induced her to admit it. She missed all the cheery, pleasant gossip of the Glen and the little village, the daily intercourse with her own folk, the give and take of a social life which, if limited, was at least very sincere. Achree and Creagh were evidently two different places in the estimation of her circle, for nobody but the Edens and the Drummonds took the trouble to look her up, and even they did not come often. All the fun and all the social life apparently fell to Malcolm's share.

She was thinking of all this one morning as she sauntered down to the gate to meet the post-gig. She was a little late, she found by the watch-bracelet on her arm, and wondered as she glanced down the long white line of the road, on which there was not a single moving object visible, whether she had missed David Bain.

She had been over at the keeper's house about half a mile distant, inquiring after a woman who had had a new baby and, meeting the doctor from Comrie there, had stopped a little to talk with him. She had assured him that he need not call at Creagh, unless indeed he particularly wanted to see her father--as he had not been so well for years as he had been since they came up to live on the Moor.

Presently she saw something in the distance--a man on horseback, rather a rare spectacle on the moorland road at that season of the year. She thought at first that it must be Neil Drummond, who was the only horseman that ever came to Creagh. But a nearer glance assured her that the figure was a heavier one than Neil's, and, besides, she did not recognize the horse, though she could see that it was a good one.

She waited a few minutes longer, and as the horseman drew rapidly nearer she recognized the figure as that of Rosmead. This surprised her very much. Somehow, she had never imagined that an American man, though even a distinguished builder of bridges, would ride a horse and look so well on it.

Having no doubt that he was coming to Creagh, she opened the gate and stood by the white post until he came up. She admired the ease with which he sat, proving thereby that he was no novice on a horse's back. He looked uncommonly well-pleased to see her, and before he reached the gate he saluted her and threw himself to the ground.

Catching the reins over his arm, he took off his hat and kept it under his arm until she had given him her hand.

"It's a case of Mahomet coming to the mountain, Miss Mackinnon. I am here to-day on my mother's behalf and with a message from her."

"Yes?" said Isla, and her smile was bright and very sweet.

She had felt left out in the cold, and that feeling of neglect accounted for the little glow at her heart which had been kindled by the sincere cordiality of Rosmead's greeting.

"Do you know that she feels quite aggrieved," said he, "to think that she has been a month in Achree and that you have never called once to inquire or to make her acquaintance."

"I am very sorry. I did not think--" replied Isla a little confusedly. "And since, as I understand, my brother has paid many calls at Achree I did not think it necessary that I should call. Besides, I am very much tied here on account of my father's health----"

"I understand that," he said gently.

"And it is a long way to Achree," she continued, "and we have no horse or trap of any kind. But I will come one day very soon and make my apologies. I hope that you are pretty comfortable in the house, and that your mother likes it."

"She loves it. She has settled down, and from present signs I don't see that we shall ever get her out of it again," he answered with a laugh, watching at the game time the mobile face beside him.

He thought it the sweetest face that he had ever seen and--almost he could have said--the dearest. Yet Hylton Rosmead had seen many fair women, among whom he might without doubt have made his choice.

"I am so glad," said Isla a little wistfully. "And your sisters--do they, too, like it?"

"They do. Glenogle and Lochearn in such a spring as this leave little, I think, to be desired in the way of winsomeness. I myself feel as if I belonged here, which, I dare say, you consider great presumption on my part."

"Indeed no," said Isla, with a swift, kind glance. "I feel very glad to know that that is how you regard Achree."

"I came with a message from my mother and also, I must confess, on my own account to tell you that I have to leave Scotland for a few months."

"Oh!" said Isla, and her face unaccountably fell.

But Rosmead was not yet sufficiently acquainted with the play of its expression to understand that his news had disappointed her. Neither was he vain enough to imagine that her expression had altered because of his announcement of his impending departure.

"Where are you going?" she asked a moment later.

"Back to America. The object for which I came to this country is accomplished, and I really have no excuse for remaining longer here."

"Oh!" said Isla again, a little dully. "Somehow I imagined that you were going to settle in Scotland, though of course that was a very absurd supposition on my part."

"Not so very absurd. It is what I should like to do--what I hope to do one day. But, in the meantime, I must not forget that I am a partner in an American business and that I am expected to go back with my report."

"What report?"

"You have forgotten, of course, that I told you I was a bridge-builder. Why should you remember it?" he asked lightly. "I came over to meet the engineers and the contractors who have to do with your splendid bridges here, and in the fall I shall have to go down south, where my firm has undertaken to build one of the biggest cantilever bridges in the world."

"Oh!" said Isla a third time. "And you will not come back?"

"I hope that I shall return later in the year--probably to spend Christmas with my mother and sisters."

"They will remain here, then? You wish to extend the term of your tenancy of Achree? Do you remember it was to be for six months?"

"With the option of remaining for a year. That was made very clear, I think, at the beginning, and, as I said, my mother will not be easily ousted from Achree. She is of Scottish parentage, you know. Her mother was a Farquharson, so she imagines that she has a special claim on Scotland. Happily your brother does not mind the extension."

A sort of chill fell on Isla at mention of Malcolm's name, though why she could not have told. She had no fear that he had not made himself pleasant or agreeable at Achree; but, somehow, disaster seemed to associate itself with his name. She feared to pursue the subject. But Rosmead, quite unaware of her feeling in the matter, none of the gossip of the Glen having reached his ears, went on quietly.

"We've had several long talks about it, and practically it is arranged that we take the place on a two years' lease."

"You have arranged that with Malcolm!" she said a little faintly.

"Yes," said Rosmead. "He has been most kind about it. He tells me he has resigned his commission on account of his father's health but that he intends and hopes to get some estate management. I appreciate his kindness to us all the more on that account."

Isla, who heard all this for the first time, felt a natural thrill of indignation because she had been kept in the dark.

"I don't see that there is so very much kindness," she said quickly. "You pay very handsomely for the house."

"It is worth it," he said heartily. "The old Rosmead place in Virginia my mother has lent to her youngest sister, lately made a widow. She is looking after all the servants, and we have not the smallest anxiety about it, so you see, things have arranged themselves very nicely for us."

"Your home is in Virginia, then?" said Isla in tones of deep interest, which flattered Rosmead not a little.

"Yes. My grandfather was a big planter there, and had many slaves. Of course the war changed all that, but the place remains the same. I should like you to see Virginia, Miss Mackinnon, and my old home. It is a beautiful place."

"It seems odd that you should be so willing to leave it!"

"It had sad associations for my mother and also for my sister Vivien, who was married in the neighbourhood and was--and was--not very happy. But there--I have all this time been talking about myself, and not at all about you. Your father, I hear, is very well. I dare say, your brother's return has helped him greatly."

"Yes, I think it has," said Isla, trying to be cordial as well as loyal. "And Creagh suits him. It is very high and clear up there, and he is able to potter about just as he likes. You will come in and see him? Even his mind is much stronger. Certainly he now grasps the fact of your residence at Achree, and, I am sure, he would like to make your acquaintance properly."

"I should like to come in and see him, if I may," said Rosmead. "But before we go in will you promise to go sometimes to see my mother when I am gone? I don't know why I should ask this, but I do."

"I shall be sure to go, Mr. Rosmead. But when do you leave Scotland?"

"Next Thursday. My boat sails from Liverpool on Saturday afternoon, and I have some business in London on the Friday."

"I shall come before then, of course, and I am very sorry I have been so rude and unneighbourly," said Isla, and she meant what she said. "Do you mind walking round with me to the stable and putting your horse in? The accommodation is quite good, but there is no groom," she added with a small, pitiful smile which touched him inexpressibly.

Her whole personality appealed to him. The grave, unimpressionable Hylton P. Rosmead, accounted by his colleagues one of the hardest-headed men of his time, was so moved by this woman, whom he had seen so few times, that he could have taken her in his arms there and then, and asked nothing better than to keep her for the rest of his life and hers.

She was so sweetly natural and womanly, so altogether devoid of pretension that she appealed to every fibre in his being. He hated the artificiality of the women of his set--the smart women whom he had met in New York society and who were ready to make much of the "Bridge-builder," as they called him--and to pour the incense of their flattery upon him. But the atmosphere had always impressed him as being insincere, and he had often told his mother that if he ever married it would be in some very unexpected place. He knew now that he had found the place and the woman.

All unconscious of what was passing in his mind, Isla led the way to the stables, stood by while he tied up his horse, and then walked back with him, pointing out the beauty of the situation and the incomparable view from the little plateau on which the house was built.

"Now I wonder whether David Bain has ever come. I suppose you saw nothing of him on the road, Mr. Rosmead?"

"Nothing. He was ahead of me, I am sure, because he is the most punctual person I have ever heard tell of. I have heard that in Glenogle they set their clocks by David."

Isla passed into the house with a smile on her lips and, crossing the narrow hall, opened the door of the dining-room which her father used as a library and sitting-room.

And there she stood just a moment as if frozen upon the threshold. Her father was not in his accustomed chair, but lay on the hearthrug, where he had evidently fallen with the page of an open letter grasped tightly in his hand.