Bog-Myrtle and Peat Part 21

So all through the darkness he paced in front of the house of the Beloved. His letter to her, written on leaves of his notebook, in place of that which he had destroyed, went in with the morning's milk. In half an hour after he was with her. And when he came out again he had seen a wonderful thing--a beautiful woman to whom emotion was life, and the expression of it second nature, running through the gamut of twenty moods in a quarter of an hour. At the end, John departed in search of a licence and a church. And Miriam Gale put her considering finger to her lip, and said, "Let me see--which dresses shall I take?"

The highway robbery was never heard of. The excellent plaster which John Arniston left in the hand of the official had salved effectively the rude constriction of his throat, where John's right hand had closed upon it.

It was even better to sit with Miriam Arniston in reality in the great sun-lit square of St. Mark's than it had been in fantasy with Miriam Gale.

The only disappointment was, that the pigeons of the Square were certainly fatter and greedier than the pictured cloud of doves, which in his day-dream he had seen flash the under-side of their wings at his love as they checked themselves to alight at her feet.

But on Lido side there was no such rift in the lute's perfection. The sands, the wheeling sea-birds, the tall girl in white whose hand he held--all these were even as he had imagined them. Thither they came every day, pa.s.sing along the straight dusty avenue, and then wandering for hours picking sh.e.l.ls. They talked only when the mood took them, and in the pauses they listened idly to the slumbrous pulsations of Adria.

John Arniston had lied at large in the letter he had written to his love. He had a.s.saulted a man who righteously withstood him in the discharge of his duty, in order to steal that letter back again. Yet his conscience was wholly void of offence in the matter. The heavens smiled upon his bride and himself. There was now no stern voice to break through upon his blissful self-approval.

Why there should be this favouritism among the commandments, was not clear to John. Indeed, the thing did not trouble him. He was no casuist.

He only knew that the way was clear to Miriam Gale, and he went to her the swiftest way.

But there were, for all that, the elements of a very pretty dilemma in the psychology of morals in the case of Miriam Gale and John Arniston.

True, the calf-skin Bible said when it was consulted, "The letter killeth, but the spirit maketh alive."

But, after all, that might prove upon examination to have nothing to do with the matter.

VI

THE GLISTERING BEACHES

_For wafts of unforgotten music come, All unawares, into my lonely room, To thrill me with the memories of the past-- Sometimes a tender voice from out the gloom, A light hand on the keys, a shadow cast Upon a learned tome That blurs somewhat Alpha and Omega, A touch upon my shoulder, a pale face, Upon whose perfect curves the firelight plays, Or love-lit eyes, the sweetest e'er I saw_.

"_Memory Harvest_."

It was clear morning upon Suliscanna. That lonely rock ran hundreds of feet up into the heavens, and pointed downwards also to the deepest part of the blue. Simeon and Anna were content.

Or, rather, I ought to say Anna and Simeon, and that for a reason which will appear. Simeon was the son of the keeper of the temporary light upon Suliscanna, Anna the daughter of the contractor for the new lighthouse, which had already begun to grow like a tall-shafted tree on its rock foundation at Easdaile Point. Suliscanna was not a large island--in fact, only a mile across the top; but it was quite six or eight in circ.u.mference when one followed the ins and outs of the rocky sh.o.r.e. Tremendous cliffs rose to the south and west facing the Atlantic, pierced with caves into which the surf thundered or grumbled, according as the uneasy giant at the bottom of the sea was having a quiet night of it or the contrary. Gra.s.sy and bare was the top of the island. There was not a single tree upon it; and, besides the men's construction huts, only a house or two, so white that each shone as far by day as the lighthouse by night.

There was often enough little to do on Suliscanna. At such times, after standing a long time with hands in their pockets, the inhabitants used to have a happy inspiration: "Ha, let us go and whitewash the cottages!"

So this peculiarity gave the island an undeniably cheerful appearance, and the pa.s.sing ships justly envied the residents.

Simeon and Anna were playmates. That is, Anna played with Simeon when she wanted him.

"Go and knit your sampler, girl!" Simeon was saying to-day. "What do girls know about boats or birds?"

He was in a bad humour, for Anna had been unbearable in her exactions.

"Very well," replied Anna, tossing her hair; "I can get the key of the boat and you can't. I shall take Donald out with me."

Now, Donald was the second lighthouse-keeper, detested of Simeon. He was grown-up and contemptuous. Also he had whiskers--horrid ugly things, doubtless, but whiskers. So he surrendered at discretion.

"Go and get the key, then, and we will go round to the white beaches.

I'll bring the provisions."

He would have died any moderately painless death rather than say, "The oatcake and water-keg."

So in a little they met again at the Boat Cove which Providence had placed at the single inlet upon the practicable side of Suliscanna, which could not be seen from either the Laggan Light or the construction cottages. Only the lighter that brought the hewn granite could spy upon it.

"Mind you sneak past your father, Anna!" cried Simeon, afar off.

His voice carried clear and lively. But yet higher and clearer rose the reply, spoken slowly to let each word sink well in.

"Teach-your-grandmother-to-suck-eggs--ducks' eggs!"

What the private sting of the discriminative, only Simeon knew. And evidently he did know very well, for he kicked viciously at a dog belonging to Donald the second keeper--a brute of a dog it was; but, missing the too-well-accustomed cur, he stubbed his toe. He then repeated the multiplication table. For he was an admirable boy and careful of his language.

But, nevertheless, he got the provision out with care and prompt.i.tude.

"Where are you taking all that cake?" said his mother, who came from Ayrshire and wanted a reason for everything. In the north there is no need for reasons. There everything is either a judgment or a dispensation, according to whether it happens to your neighbour or yourself.

"I am no' coming hame for ony dinner," said Simeon, who adopted a modified dialect to suit his mother. With his father he spoke English only, in a curious sing-song tone but excellent of accent.

Mrs. Lauder--Simeon's mother, that is--accepted the explanation without remark, and Simeon pa.s.sed out of her department.

"Mind ye are no' to gang intil the boat!" she cried after him; but Simeon was apparently too far away to hear.

He looked cautiously up the side of the Laggan Light to see that his father was still polishing at his morning bra.s.ses and reflectors along with Donald. Then he ran very swiftly through a little storehouse, and took down a musket from the wall. A powder-flask and some shot completed his outfit; and with a prayer that his father might not see him, Simeon sped to the trysting-stone. As it happened, his father was oblivious and the pilfered gun unseen.

Anna's experience had been quite different. Her procedure was much simpler. She found her father sitting in his office, constructed of rough boards. He frowned continuously at plans of dovetailed stones, and rubbed his head at the side till he was rapidly rubbing it bare.

Anna came in and looked about her.

"Give me the key of the boat," she said without preface. She used from habit, even to her father, the imperative mood affirmative.

Mr. Warburton looked up, smoothed his brow, and began to ask, "What are you going to do--?" But in the midst of his question he thought better of it, acknowledging its uselessness; and, reaching into a little press by his side, he took down a key and handed it to Anna without comment.

Anna said only, "Thank you, father." For we should be polite to our parents when they do as we wish them.

She stood a moment looking back at the bowed figure, which, upon her departure, had resumed the perplexed frown as though it had been a mask.

Then she walked briskly down to the boathouse.

Upon the eastern side of Suliscanna there is a beach. It is a rough beach, but landing is just possible. There are cunning little spits of sand in the angles of the stone reaches, and by good steering between the boulders it is just possible to make boat's-way ash.o.r.e.

"Row!" said Anna, after they had pushed the boat off, and began to feel the hoist of the swell. "I will steer."

Simeon obediently took the oars and fell to it. So close in did Anna steer to one point, that, raising her hand, she pulled a few heads of pale sea-pink from a dry cleft as they drew past into the open water and began to climb green and hissing mountains.

Then Anna opened her plans to Simeon.

"Listen!" she said. "I have been reading in a book of my father's about this place, and there was a strange great bird once on Suliscanna. It has been lost for years, so the book says; and if we could get it, it would be worth a hundred pounds. We are going to seek it."