Three Boys Part 46

Turning to Max, he waved him toward the door.

"No, no, not to-day," said Grant, who read the young visitor's reluctance to go.

"But ta chiel' lo'es ta pipes," cried Donald.

"Then you shall play to him another time."

"Yes, another time, Tonal'. Be off now, and I'll bring ye a wee drappie by and by," cried Kenneth.

"She'll pring her a wee drappie? Good laddie! She shall pring her a wee drappie, and she wa.s.s nice and try up in the tower, and she wa.s.s make a nice fire."

He made a mysterious sign or two, suggestive of his making a silent promise to give his young master all the music he had intended for Max, and went slowly out of the great stone-floored place.

"Noo, send oot the dogs," said Grant; and, to make sure, he did it himself, a quiet wave of his hand being sufficient to drive them all out into the yard behind the kitchen.

"She said she should soon pe fine," said Long Shon, as a gleam of sunshine shot through the window; for the storm was pa.s.sing over, and its rearguard, in the form of endless ragged fleecy clouds, could be seen racing across the blue sky; while, in an hour from then, the sky was swept clear, and the sun shone out bright and warm.

"Now," cried Kenneth, "let's get the rifles, and go and have a stalk."

"It would jist aboot be madness," said Grant; "and the Chief would be in a fine way. Tell him he can't go."

"Oh ay! he's spout richt, Maister Ken. She's too fu' o' watter to go over the mountain and through ta glen."

"She wa.s.s saying she'd go and tak' the young chentleman to see the fa's."

"Ay, there's a gran' fa' o' watter the noo," said Tavish.

"Oh, very well, then; let's go and see the falls. Come along, Scoody.

I'll get a gun. You'll take yours, Max."

"Shall I?"

"Yes, of course. We may get a good shot at something."

The two lads went back into the hall, and, pa.s.sing through a swing door, they suddenly came upon The Mackhai pacing up and down.

He looked up, frowning as he caught sight of Max, and was evidently going to say something; but he checked himself, and went quickly into the library and shut the door.

"I'd give something to know what's the matter with father," said Kenneth thoughtfully. "He never used to be like this."

Max felt uncomfortable, and, being very sensitive, he turned to his companion:

"Have I done anything to annoy him?" he asked.

"You? No. What nonsense! There, come along. We haven't had such a day as this for ever so long, and I've been indoors till I can hardly breathe. Why not have a sail?"

Max looked aghast at the heaving sea.

"Perhaps it is a bit too rough," said Kenneth. "Never mind; we'll go and see the falls."

Ten minutes later they were skirting round the little bay, to turn in by the first swollen river, to track its bed up to the mountain, where the "fa's" they were to see were to be found, and, even as they went, a low, deep, humming sound came to the ear, suggestive of some vast machinery in motion; while the river at their side ran as if it were so much porter covered with froth, great flakes of which were eddying here and there, and being cast up in iridescent patches on the stony banks.

At the end of a quarter of an hour's climbing and stumbling among the wet rocks and bushes, during which the two big dogs had been trotting quietly along at their master's heels, and Sneeshing, in a wonderful state of excitement, hunting everywhere for that rabbit which he had on his mind, Max stopped short.

"Hallo! Tired?" cried Kenneth, laughing.

"Oh no! But it seems such a pity to go hurrying on. Wait a few minutes."

Kenneth laughed, and yet he could not help feeling gratified at his companion's enthusiasm.

"Here, hold hard a bit, Tawy," he cried. "Stop a bit, Shon."

The two men halted; the dogs settled themselves upon a sunny rock, Bruce with his pointed nose comfortably across Dirk's rough, warm frill, and Sneeshing curled himself up in the angle formed by the two dogs' bodies, close up to and as much under Dirk's long hair as he could; while Scoodrach seated himself on a huge block of black slate, which did not belong to the place, but must have fallen from some vein high up the gorge, and been brought down by wintry floods, a little way at a time, during hundreds of years, till it lay jammed in among the great blocks of granite like a chip in a basin of lumps of sugar. This piece of slate suited Scoodrach's eye, and he took out his big knife and began to sharpen it.

Long Shon took a little curly sheep's horn out of his pouch, and had a pinch of snuff.

Tavish filled a dumpy black wooden pipe, and began to smoke; while Kenneth, as he smilingly watched Max, hummed over Black Donald's bagpipe tune, "The March of the Clan Mackhai."

"Well," said Kenneth at last, breaking the silence, through which came a low, deep, humming roar, "what do you think of Dunroe?"

"Think!" cried Max, in a low, deep voice; "it's heavenly."

And he stood gazing up the narrow glen, with its intensely dark shadows among the rocks, through which the brilliant sun-rays struck down, making the raindrops which hung upon the delicate leaves of the pendent birches glisten like diamonds.

For it was one beautiful series of pictures at which the lad gazed: patches of vivid blue above, seen through the openings among the trees; right below, the foaming river coming down in a hundred miniature falls; silver-stemmed and ruddy-bronze birches rooting in the sides, and sending their leaves and twigs hanging over like cascades of verdure; pines and spruces rising up on all sides like pyramids of deep, dark green; and everywhere the ma.s.ses of rock glittering with crystals, and clothed with mosses of the most vivid tints, and among whose crevices the ferns threw up their pointed, softly-laced fronds.

The sunlight glanced down like sheaves of dazzling silver arrows; and over the water, and softly riding down the glen, came soft, filmy clouds of mist, so fine and delicate that they constantly faded into invisibility; while every now and then there were pa.s.sing glimpses of colour appearing and disappearing over the rushing torrent, as if there had been a rainbow somewhere up above--one which had broken up, and these were its fragments being borne away.

"I never saw anything so beautiful," said Max, almost wondering at his companion's want of enthusiasm.

"And do you know what makes it so beautiful?"

"It was made so."

"Yes; but it is the sun. If a black cloud came over now, and it began to rain, the place would look so gloomy and miserable that you'd want to hurry home."

"Yes; ta young Chief's richt," said Tavish, nodding his head. "It's ta ferry wettest place I know when ta rain comes doon and ta wind will plow."

"Let's go on," said Kenneth after awhile. "It gets more and more beautiful higher up."

"It can't be!" cried Max. "And is this all your father's property?"

"Yes," said Kenneth proudly; "this all belongs to The Mackhai."

"Ant it will aal pelong to ta young Chief some tay, when he crows a pig man."

Max went on with a sigh, but only to find that the place really did grow more beautiful as they climbed on, while the deep, humming roar grew louder and more awe-inspiring as they penetrated farther and farther into the recesses of the mountain. For the long and heavy rain had charged the fountains of the hills to bursting. Every lakelet was br.i.m.m.i.n.g, every patch of moss saturated, and from a thousand channels, that were at first mere threads, the water came rushing down to coalesce in the narrow glen, and eddy, and leap, and swirl, and hurry on toward the sea.

"Why are we climbing up so high?" said Max suddenly.