Highland Ballad Part 9

Back from the land, of withered hand To islands where the living stand

With arms apart, and naked heart This spell to Thee I do command.

Send spirit forth, by dark stream's course If h.e.l.l itself should be the source Let Cerberus' gate, not hold his fate But shatter walls With killing force.

All this she read, and more besides, until her arms seemed to open of their own accord, in the final gesture of invocation. Then with the trembling emotions of a lifetime, she said his name.....

Nothing happened.

A slight freshening of the breeze, nothing more. The spell had failed.

All her mother's arts were but seeming and superst.i.tion. Michael remained on the other side of Death's iron door, unreachable. She fell forward onto the bitter earth, overcome by unquenchable despair.....

She heard a sound.

Was it again the wind's mockery of bagpipes, the faintest strain playing upon her mind alone? She listened again. The sound grew stronger, undeniable, moving toward her from the west. Far away it seemed, from the depths of the ravine, which led after many miles to the sea. It played Scotland the Brave, a poignant sound in that dismal place, as she heard in its every note a proud defiance of death and darkness. She got to her feet, and moving to the very edge of the shelf, peered intently into the wavering vale below.

The sound continued to come on, nearer and nearer, then suddenly ceased, now surely no more than two hundred yards away. She strained her every sense for sight or sound of him, in vain. She began to despair once more, until it occurred to her that perhaps the torchlight held his troubled spirit at bay. Quickly she returned to the Stone, and forcing out the beacon, rolled its lighted k.n.o.b against the hissing turf until it sputtered and went out. Then moving back to the ledge she rejoined her vigil, prepared to wait all night.

But she did not have to. Almost at once she perceived the figure of a man, moving slowly through the fog. It came on steadily, down the center of the vale. Now hidden by the mist, now clearly outlined: a kilted Scottish soldier, pale and weary, wandering it seemed to her, without direction or hope. Her heart leapt inside her, reaching out to him with all that she was.

The curly head was raised at last, still vague with distance. The figure stopped, as if sensing some presence. . .then turned and looked up at her. A face once handsome and strong. His name was instantly upon her lips, as in fear and ecstasy she made to cry out to him---

Suddenly from behind her came a whoosh and swell of blazing light, and a harsh voice crying harsh words. She whirled to see her mother outlined in fire and smoke against the blood-red backdrop of the Stone. Then pushing past her, the witch hurled a flaming brand into the abyss.

"In se nama Dagda!" she cried in anger. "Baek wealcan sawol, to Helan!" A great billowing fog engulfed the place where the figure had stood. And when it cleared again, he was gone.

Still her mother stood poised, waited expectantly, a blackened rib held in her uplifted hand.

But when the apparition did not reappear, slowly she lowered it. .

.and the look of wild fear pa.s.sed from her eyes. She trembled, and spat upon the ground. Then with a sharp look at the girl, she turned to extinguish the swift bonfire she had made.

Then without a word, she took the sobbing girl by the wrist and led her away. Utterly devastated, Mary did not resist.

Only when they were safely shut up inside the lair did the old woman give vent to her fear and vexation.

"By all the G.o.ds, girl. . .you shall do no such thing again! Did you want to lose your own soul as well?"

"I don't care!" cried her daughter sullenly. "I don't care."

And with the utterance of these words, rising as they did from her long suppressed darker nature, something precious and fine collapsed inside her: the will to live, and keep giving. She moved listlessly to sit before the fire, not for warmth, but only to turn her back on the endless pain and disillusion of this world.

All was lost, and darkness overwhelmed her.

Thirteen

The next morning she was just the same, sitting silently before the fire, with unseeing eyes gazing into it, thinking not of light but of darkness. Her mother, who had slept little and worried much, offered her tea and breakfast, which she refused. She asked her then to build up the fire, to which the girl consented, though not for any reason that her mother might have hoped. And this solitary action, which she repeated several times that day, was all the movement that the woman could rouse from her.

When evening came, she asked her daughter why she stared into the coals. Mary answered simply, without emotion. "I am watching the fire die. Like a human life, no matter how many times it is built up, the end is always the same. And when the will to feed it is gone, there is death." With this she turned slowly towards her mother, adding with grim satisfaction. "Yes. At least there is Death." Then she turned away again, the faint smile dissolving into the stone coldness of her face.

The witch spent the whole of that first day, and much of the second, reading through her books of lore, trying to find some spell or charm that would cure her daughter's malady. Because to her understanding, she had been touched by some dark spirit of the Netherworld, or perhaps possessed in some measure by the Stone itself.

But what ailed the girl was not the work of witchcraft, and there was nothing in her mother's books or box of talismans that would move or affect her in the least. What the old woman could not see, because it was too close to her own experience, was that Mary had given herself heart and soul to a man she could never have, the only man that she would ever love; and without him all life seemed but a mockery of hope. There was no longer any reason to live, nor did she wish to find one. And so she had resolved to die, death being the only comfort she could see on the black horizon of her ravaged world.

Her mother put her to bed on that second night, to which she consented only because it was less troublesome than to refuse. And whether she slept at all the woman could not have said, for in the morning she lay exactly as she had before, hands at her sides, staring blankly at some fixed point above her. Again she would not eat, and rising, drank a little water only because her throat felt dry and uncomfortable.

But as the third morning wore on, the young girl began to show signs of agitation, as it recalling some unpleasant fact that interfered with her sullen wish to die. All at once she stood up from the chair, pulling the hair at her temples and groaning angrily. The old woman, glad for any sign of life, stepped closer.

"What is it, Mary?"

"The fool! The fool!" she raged, pacing back and forth like a caged animal.

"Who?"

"Stephen Purceville! Today we are to, 'Ride again, and make our love in the fields.' Oh, if he only knew how I detest him now!"

As if some horrid music box which played always the same restless dirge, the lid of it thus lifted, her mother's long obsession for vengeance once more began to work inside her. Even then.

"You must be careful, la.s.s. If you tell him as much there could be trouble, and not the swift and easy death you seem to long for. If you truly wish to hurt him---"

Mary cut her short with a swift, knifing motion of her arm. Upon hearing these words an intolerable irritation had come over her at the stupidity of these sorry puppets: her mother, and the Purcevilles both young and old, playing out their little games of l.u.s.t and hate, as if they mattered at all in the end. How could they fail to see that everything, everything ended in death and ruin? All their petty desires were less than meaningless; they were absurd.

But this was not what lay at the heart of her unease. For at the thought of her half-brother, and of the very real threat he posed, the will to survive had once more begun to a.s.sert itself inside her. She was afraid. And this simple, undeniable impulse---the desire to avoid pain and danger---tormented her now because it would not be suppressed. Death she did not fear. But thoughts of trying to fight off her brother's oblivious, self-satisfied advances, the possibility of rape or imprisonment if she refused him..... These she could not face.

"I've got to get out of here!" she said suddenly, as if herself a puppet whose strings had been violently jerked. And rushing to the door before her mother could stop her, she broke from the hut and began running wildly down the path, her one desire to reach its root and turn aside before Stephen Purceville could arrive there, trapping her in the narrow pa.s.s.

She did not know how narrowly she succeeded. For no sooner had she reached and taken the track west, climbing a shallow hill and then dropping again out of sight, than the expectant officer on his panting steed arrived at the meeting of ways, and began climbing steadily the final stretch to the hut, and the long-awaited rendezvous with his imagined lover.

Fourteen

The man called Jamie spent the night, and the two days following, at the cottage of the fisherman. This had in no way been planned. But he had woken trembling and feverish, and with a deep cough that would not be silenced. It was as if only now, when it had reached a safe haven, that his body could tell him of its many ills and deprivations.

The old man insisted that he remain in bed, at least until the high fever broke. As to thoughts of his own safety, he had none; and with the heavy overcast and clinging fog he deemed it prudent, and a necessary risk, to keep him from the cold and damp of out-of-doors.

The younger man at length agreed, not because it seemed wise, but because it was inevitable. He had no choice. Once so healthy and robust, he now felt a dull ache in the very marrow of his bones, and a chill that would not be abated. So he remained in bed, and with forced patience, pa.s.sed the two hard days.

But on the succeeding morning---perhaps two hours before Mary fled in panic from the hut---he felt again the deep restlessness which had troubled him three days before. Something was wrong. Someone dear to him was in danger. He could not have said how he knew this; but know it he did, and resolved then and there to pay call upon those he loved. Though he was still far from well, and fully realized the risk, this instinctive sense would not be overruled. He now found it as impossible to remain in the cottage as it had previously been to leave.

He thanked the fisherman for all that he had done, and promised to send word to him, or come himself, as soon as he knew that all was well. And he promised to be careful. The veteran was concerned: his experience had taught him the inadvisability of haste. But seeing the intensity of the younger man's face he could only wish him well, and after he had gone, say a silent prayer for him in his own fashion.

The wheels of fate were turning. Events were in G.o.d's hands now.

Mary wandered aimlessly across the high plateau toward the sea, feeling lost and miserable. As she walked she watched the fog rise slowly and evaporate, along with all faith in herself. Vaguely she told herself that she would never again live with her mother in the dark, dismal hut, where everything was smoke and confusion. But even this seemed a wavering resolve. How could she promise herself anything, when she had been so weak.....

A single tear broke from the stillness of her face, as she realized that in all the haste of her flight she had nonetheless seized the heavy cloak from its peg by the door, the same which she now wrapped about her. She cried because this instinctive action showed her, more even than the painful workings of her mind, that a part of her still wanted to live. As much as she had loved Michael, and loathed the thought of a world without him. . .still, she desired life. It was in that moment an unbearable anguish.