Red Rowans Part 6

"What a hurry you seem to be in to begin work; and I am always in such a hurry to begin play. But then you have arrived, or are about to arrive, at the years of discretion, and I am a mere child of forty-one. Twenty years between us, dear! It is a lifetime; and what right have I, or any other old foozle, to dictate to you, Mademoiselle Grands-serieux, who, clever as she is, hardly knows, I think, when her most affectionate and unworthy guardian is attempting a jest. It is an evil habit in the old. Expect to hear from the School Committee in Hounslow before many days are over. I think all is settled fairly, but I hear there is no chance of your being needed before the beginning of November. And this is still July. Three whole months, therefore, ere Mademoiselle need take up the burden of teaching vulgar little boys the elements of Euclid. And yet the momentous coming of age, when Wisdom, let us hope, is to be justified of one of her children, is this week. Marjory, my dear! Fate has given you a real holiday at last! Of course, I am an incorrigible idler compared to you, but, believe me, my heart has ached at times over your sense of duty! Life is not all work, even if it is not all beer and skittles. So take the goods the G.o.ds provide (as dear old Wilson would say in the proper tongue--my Latin is merely a catalogue of dry bones)--put away all the books--let two and two be five or five hundred for the time, while you cross the a.s.ses' Bridge with the rest of humanity. Wake up, my dear little girl! or rather begin to dream! Of what? you ask. Of anything, my dear, except Woman's Suffrage. By the way, I have six new reasons against the latter, which I will detail to Mademoiselle Grands-serieux when a detestable bacillus, who will neither be born nor die, permits of my joining her in the earthly paradise. Meanwhile have a good time--a real good time."

Marjory leant back again on a great basket of spreading lastrea which gave out scent like honey as she crushed it. Cousin Tom was delightful, and perhaps he was right. The sudden content with Life as it was which had come to her the day before when she realised its peace, its beauty, its kindliness, returned now. Through the arching hazel boughs the sunlight filtered down in a tempered brilliance restful to the eyes; a gra.s.shopper shrilled in the bents; a yellow b.u.t.terfly, settling on a leaf beside her, folded its wings and, apparently, went to sleep. An earthly paradise, indeed! Surely if one could dream anywhere it would be here.

Suddenly a faint _shwish-shwish_ broke the silence. _Shwish-shwish_, at regularly recurring intervals. Marjory, recognising the sound, wondered listlessly who could be fishing the lower pool at this early hour. One of the keepers, perhaps, hopeful of a trout for his master's breakfast; rather a forlorn chance even in the pot above, with that cloudless sky. A jarring whizz, accompanied by a convulsion in the alder branches, broke in on her drowsiness, making her sit up with intelligent appreciation of the cause. The somebody, whoever he might be, was "in" to the tree. Another convulsion, gentler, but more prolonged; another short and sharp, as if somebody were losing his temper. Then a persuasive wiggle to all points of the compa.s.s in turn, and finally the whirr of a check reel.

Somebody being evidently about to try conclusions with Nature, Marjory leant forward in deep interest, knowing by bitter experience that it was two to one against humanity. At last, as she expected, there came a series of short, sharp jerks; then something she had not expected.

On the morning air one comprehensive monosyllable--"d.a.m.n." That was all. No affix, no suffix; without nominative or accusative; soft, but trenchant.

"A gentleman," said Marjory to herself, without a moment's hesitation, as she rose to peer through the thick tangle of alders. If so, the laird, of course. Yes! It must be he, on the opposite bank, standing irresolute; weighing the pros and cons of breaking in, no doubt.

Marjory's experienced eyes following the taut line, rested finally on the cast looped round a branch just above her, and apparently within reach. The mere possibility was sufficient to make her forget all save the instinct to help.

"Don't break, please, I can get it."

Her eager voice, unmistakably girlish and refined, echoed across to Paul Macleod, who, after a moment's astonished search, traced it to a face half-seen among the parting leaves. He took off his hat mechanically, for though it might have been a pixie's there was no mistaking its gender, and the s.e.x found a large measure of outward respect in Paul Macleod. For the rest, help offered was with him invariably help accepted; a fact which accounted for a large portion of his popularity, since people like those around whom the memory of their own benevolence can throw a halo. So he stood watching Marjory settle methodically to her task, wondering the while who the girl could possibly be. For that she had white hands and trim ankles was abundantly evident, and neither of these charms was to be expected in the rustic beauties of the Glen.

"I am afraid I am giving you a lot of trouble," he said sympathetically, as for the third time the branch flew back from Marjory's hold with a sudden spring.

"Not at all," she gasped jerkily; one cannot speak otherwise on tiptoe with both hands above one's head.

"Perhaps I had better help."

"Perhaps you had," she answered resentfully, desisting for a moment after a fourth rebuff. "There is no positive necessity for you to remain idle. You might for instance reel in as I pull."

His faint smile was tempered by respect. The young lady on the opposite bank knew what she was about, and, perhaps, might even be good looking, if she were not quite so red in the face. So he obeyed meekly, and was rewarded by a gasp of triumph.

"There! I've got it. I knew you could help if you tried."

"I'm immensely obliged," he began; then the girl's foot slipped, the branch sprang from her hand, she made an ineffectual jump after it, and the next instant the all but disentangled cast, flung into the air by the rebound, was hard and fast in a higher twig.

Marjory could have stamped with despite; thought it wiser to laugh, but found the opposite bank full of silent, grieved sympathy.

"I'll get it yet," she called across the water, with renewed determination.

"I think, if you'll allow me, I will break in," came the deferential voice after a time. "It really must be very tiring to jump like that."

"Not at all; thank you," she retorted, without a pause. "I never--give in."

"So it appears. Will you allow me to come over and help?"

Come over and help, indeed! Marjory's growing anger slackened to contempt. As if he could come over without a detour of half a mile down or quarter of a mile up the river; and he must know it, unless he had no memory. "You can't," she jerked between her efforts. "You had--better slack line--and sit down--I'll get it somehow."

Very much "somehow." Her hat fell off first. Then, after a desperate spring, in which she succeeded in clutching a lower branch, a hairpin struck work. Hot, dishevelled, exasperated, yet still determined, she persevered without deigning another reference to the silence over the way, until an arm clothed in grey tweed reached over hers and bent the branch down within her reach. She looked round, and, even in her surprise, the great personal charm and beauty of the face looking into hers struck her almost painfully; for it seemed to soothe her quick vexation, and so to claim something from her.

"I jumped," he said, answering the look on hers. "It is quite easy by the fall."

Something new to her, something which sent a lump to her throat, made her turn away and say stiffly: "I am sorry I gave you the trouble of coming. It would have been better if you had broken in. Good morning."

He stood grave as a judge, courteous, deferential, yet evidently amused, still bending down the bough.

"Will you not finish the task you began? You said you never gave in; besides, I can hardly do it for myself." The fact was palpable; it required two hands to disentangle a singularly awkward knot. To deny this would be to confess her own annoyance, so she turned back again.

Rather an awkward task with a face so close to your own, watching your inept.i.tude. And yet she forgot her impatience in a sudden thought. If he had fallen! If that face had had the life crushed out of it!

"You ought not to have jumped," she said, impulsively. "It was very dangerous."

"Pardon me; I have done it hundreds of times when I was a boy."

"Boys may do foolish things."

He smiled. "And men should not; but are dangerous things necessarily foolish?"

"Needlessly dangerous things are so, surely?"

"In that case, what becomes of courage?"

She paused, frankly surprised both at herself and him. How came it that he understood so quickly, that she followed him so clearly? Yet it was pleasant.

"Courage has nothing to do with the question."

His smile broadened. "Thanks. I began by saying so. The fact being that the jump is not dangerous."

"No one else jumps it," she persisted.

"Pardon me for mentioning that I am an unusually good jumper.

Besides--

"The game is never yet worth a rap For a rational man to play, Into which some misfortune, some mishap Cannot possibly find its way."

Again something new to her, something which this time sent a thrill of answering recklessness through her veins, something of the mere joy and pride of life made her ask in quick interest--"Who wrote that?"

"A man who gave in at last; he shot himself."

Marjory's face paled. Yes; men did that sort of thing, she knew. She had read of it, and accepted the truth of it calmly. Now for the first time she felt that she understood it, that she too stood on the brink of the Great Unknown Sea, which might bring her to the haven where she would be, or to shipwreck. Then in quick relief came a new cause for resentment in the perception, as she began to wind up the now disentangled cast, that a large portion of line remained attached to it. In other words, her companion had deliberately cut it, and brought his rod with him; had risked his life not for the sake of his flies, but simply to amuse himself at her expense.

"I think that is all I can do for you," she said, in a white heat of annoyance. "Good morning, Captain Macleod."

The name slipped from her unawares, and she recognised her own mistake immediately. Her knowledge of his ident.i.ty being a sort of introduction, from which she could scarcely escape. For his position as laird of Gleneira, owner of the very ground on which she was trespa.s.sing, could not be ignored. She could not dismiss him like a tramp. He took the advantage she had given him, coolly.

"Thanks, so many," he said, holding back a branch to allow of her pa.s.sing before him, "but I am going also. It is too bright for sport.

In truth, I never expected any, and only came out to renew my acquaintance with the river, and discover, what I expected, that I have almost forgotten how to throw a fly."

"Indeed, you have not forgotten how to break in, at any rate," she replied viciously; then ashamed of her unnecessary heat, since surely it was none of her business if he broke every cast he possessed, she added, in superior tones, "there is no reason, however, why you should not get a fish in the Long Pool. The sun won't touch it for half an hour."

"The Long Pool," he echoed, "which is that? I'm afraid I have almost forgotten it, too."

It was a palpable excuse for continuing the conversation, and as such Marjory resented it; at the same time, no one ever appealed to her for information without meeting with prompt attention, the teaching element being strong in her. So was impatience at cra.s.s stupidity; or, as Captain Macleod preferred to call it, a deficient b.u.mp of locality.

"I'll see you as far as the Alder Island," she said at last, with some irritation, "then you can't possibly make a mistake." That, at any rate, would be better than trailing the whole two miles back to Gleneira beside him. Not that he was forward or objectionable; on the contrary, he treated her with a deference which would have been pleasant had it not covered a quiet coercion which was perfectly intolerable. So the glint of the Long Pool behind the Alder Island came as a relief, and she pointed to it in a sort of triumph.