Will Weatherhelm Part 10

I took off my hat and sat down, wondering what strange news I was to hear. She presently made her appearance, having laid aside her walking dress. I felt myself completely at home in a moment, she looked so exactly as she had done when I last saw her on that delightful evening I spent at Plymouth, and I so well remembered her in the days of my boyhood.

"Well, Willand, I am glad to see you," said she in a kinder tone than usual. "A young man whom you know, and whose name I would rather not repeat,--indeed I do not like thinking about him,--told us that you were dead--drowned or killed somehow or other at sea. Perhaps he had his own selfish ends to serve, or perhaps he believed it; we will hope for the best."

"Who do you mean! What do you speak of, Miss Rundle?" I exclaimed, in a voice full of agitation.

"I speak of that false deceiver, that bad, heartless fellow, Charles Iffley," she answered, in a tone which showed her strong dislike to my former friend. "Do you know, some time after you were here he returned from sea, and came up here to visit me, and talked of old times and old friendships, and how I had known his poor mother and his friends, till I was quite taken with him; and then he presented me with a stuffed parrot and two little pets of Java sparrows he called them (which certainly were very merry and hopped about gaily in their cage), and a dried snake, which he told me was a great curiosity; and he used to drop in to tea nearly every evening, and certainly he used to talk very pleasantly.

However, it is not always the talkers that are the best doers or the best people. Then he began to inquire about the ladies next door, and I invited them in to meet him, and he made himself still more agreeable than ever. This went on for some time, till I saw that he admired Miss Margaret, old Mrs Sandon's niece; however, as he had plenty of money, that was no business of mine. I must say that by this time I did not think so well of him as at first. Many things he said were very incorrect, and the snake he gave me began to be so disagreeable that I was obliged to throw it away, and my maid told me that she was certain the sparrows were no great things, so we examined them carefully, and there could be no doubt about it, they were merely common English sparrows painted. When he came in and was waiting for me sometimes (for he used to watch when I was out on purpose), he used to give them a touch up, and tell me that he had been washing them and restoring their plumage, and in that way he kept up the deception so long. An old gentleman, a friend of mine, who used to be fond of poking about and looking into old curiosity shops, happened to call, and I showed him the parrot which Charles Iffley told me had come from some part of Africa or South America round Cape Horn, only that it had died before he could give it to me. When my friend saw the stuffed parrot, he turned it about and examined it, and then showing me a ticket fastened to its claw, told me that he knew the old Jew's shop where that bad fellow had bought it, and to a certainty that he had not given more than a shilling for it. All this was very provoking, and made me begin to think very differently of him to what I had done at first. I did fancy that he might have had some regard for an old friend." And the old lady drew herself up and uttered a gentle sigh. "Such a dream was soon blown to the winds," she continued. "I found that he was constantly going and calling at Mrs Sandon's, and very often he did not look in on me at all. It did not seem to me, however, that Margaret liked him, though I think her aunt thought well of him, and encouraged him to come to the house. He had never spoken of you, I found, till one day I mentioned your name, when he said, 'Ah, poor fellow! he was a great friend of mine. I first got him a ship, and helped to make a sailor of him. I was very sorry to lose him.'

"'How lose him?' asked Miss Margaret gently. Then he told them how you had been sent away in a boat expedition in Teneriffe, to cut out some prizes, and that the boat you were in had been knocked to pieces, and that you had been either killed by the shot of the enemy or drowned, and that nothing since had been heard of you."

"I cannot blame Charley, then," said I to Miss Rundle. "I have no doubt that he fully believed the statement he made. Had I not succeeded in getting on board another vessel, I should have been drowned, and we have never met since. But what occurred after this?--go on."

"You shall hear. When he saw that Miss Margaret took some interest in you, he began to talk of you in a disparaging way, as a poor sort of a fellow, easily led, and that you had all sorts of strange fancies, which he said he supposed had come to you with the northern blood which flowed in your veins, and then he spoke in no complimentary way of Scotland and the Orkney and Shetland people. He said he forgot to which you belonged. I saw the colour come into Miss Margaret's cheeks. 'I belong to Shetland myself,' said she. 'It is a country I love dearly.' On this, the young man began to apologise, and said that he was speaking without consideration; that he had known one bad Orkney man, and that was all, whereas he had known hundreds of bad Englishmen, and he hoped Miss Margaret would pardon him. She bowed, but said nothing. He did his best to make amends for what he had said, and certainly if attention would have won a woman, he would have won her. I could not help seeing that was his aim. However, his behaviour to me had not made me wish to give him any help. And, do you know, I found that he had been speaking in a very disrespectful way of me. I cannot repeat the names he called me. It showed me clearly what he was, and, though I did not like to interfere, still I only hoped he would not succeed in winning that sweet girl."

"Did he succeed, though?" I exclaimed, in a voice choking with agitation. "Oh! tell me, Miss Rundle."

"You shall hear," answered the old lady, who was not to be hurried with her narrative. "Of course, having won the good opinion of the aunt was a great point in his favour. So he used to continue to go to the house as often as ever. He took the aunt all sorts of pretty presents, though he did not venture to offer them to Margaret. At last, however, he seemed to think that the time was come when he must try his chance. So he walked in and found Margaret in the room alone, and he told her, in an off-hand sort of way, that he loved her, and that, if she would marry him, he would give up the sea and live on sh.o.r.e, and make her comfortable and happy for the rest of her days."

"Did she accept him? did she marry him?" I exclaimed, interrupting the old lady.

"You shall hear, Mr Wetherholm," she answered quietly. "What woman does not feel flattered by receiving a proposal of marriage from a fine-looking, free-spoken young man. I'm sure I should." And she put her hand mechanically before her face to hide the gentle blush which the thought conjured up on her cheek. "She thanked him, but entreated him not to persist in his offers. Then she frankly told him that one she had loved had died at sea; that her heart was buried with him in his ocean grave; and that she could not marry a man she did not love. She was very firm, and Charles Iffley could not help seeing that he had very little chance of success. She told me this shortly afterwards. He, it seems, did not give up his attempt to win her. Somehow or other, he had taken it into his head that she was speaking of you, though he was puzzled to know how you had won her heart. He returned several times to the house, but his chief occupation seems to have been in abusing you.

This made poor Miss Margaret fancy that you all the time were alive, and that he knew it; and this, of course, made her still less inclined towards him. The less way he made in her affections, the more bitter he became against you, till at last she had to tell him that his conversation was disagreeable, and that he must never come to the house again. He still did come to the door several times, but the maid told him that he must not come in, and that she would scream out murder if he attempted it. Soon after this, poor old Mrs Sandon fell ill and died, and poor Miss Margaret was left alone without any one to a.s.sist her or protect her. I asked her to come and live with me till she could make arrangements what to do. She had friends in Shetland, though that is a long way off, and I could not think what help they could afford her.

They wrote back begging that she would come to them, and that she should be like their daughter, and they would be parents to her. Well, against my advice, she resolved to set off, and away she went. She kindly wrote to me once, to tell me of her safe arrival, and she thoughtfully paid the postage, which was just like her, and very right. You shall see her letter, for I do not think she would object to my showing it to you."

I thanked Miss Rundle very much for the account she had given me, but I could with difficulty reply to her for thinking what I would do. All sorts of ideas crowded into my mind. I scarcely, however, recollected Charley Iffley and his behaviour. My thoughts flew off to Shetland, and to Margaret Troall. Miss Rundle gave me her letter. I read it over and over again. I made a note of the place from which she dated it. Miss Rundle saw me, and asked me if I was going to write to her.

"No; I intend to go to Shetland," I answered promptly. "I have made up my mind to that. After all you have told me, I shall not rest happy till I have seen her. Perhaps I shall take up my abode there altogether. My father's family come from Shetland, and if I could get Aunt Bretta to come up there also, we might all be very happy."

I was much pleased by the kind way in which Miss Rundle seemed to sympathise with me, and entered into all my views and plans, though she herself had no personal interest in them. She told me, in course of conversation, that she had not since seen Charles Iffley, but that she believed he belonged to some man-of-war or other, at the time of which she had been speaking, and that she understood he was still in the service.

My plan once formed, I lost no time in putting it into execution. That very evening I found a smack sailing for Portsmouth, and took my pa.s.sage by her. On reaching Southsea, and telling my aunt all that had occurred, she very much approved of my plans, and encouraged me to set off at once for Shetland. She sent all sorts of messages to old friends, and to the children of old friends; for, as she remarked with a sigh, it was too probable that many of the parents would have been called away from the world.

Drawing a further supply of money from the bank, I went up to London by the coach next morning. I won't stop to describe how I was bothered and confused in London, and how heartily I wished myself out of it. I found my way to London Bridge, and, after making many inquiries, I reached a place where there were several Leith smacks moored together. One was going to sail the next tide. I joyfully stepped aboard of her, and still more happy was I to find myself clear of the Thames and out at sea. We were just a week making the pa.s.sage, which was very well, considering that we had a foul wind for some hours and had to bring up in Yarmouth Roads. From Leith I got on by another vessel to Aberdeen.

In that port I found a regular trader which sailed once a month to Lerwick, in Shetland. She was a smack, but not equal in size to the craft in which I had come down from London to Leith.

We had been out about three days when very heavy thick weather came on, and a south-westerly gale sprung up, which came sweeping through the pa.s.sage between Orkney and Shetland, kicking up a terrific sea. The smack behaved very well, but at last all that could be done was to set a try-sail and to heave her to, and away we drifted we knew not where. I had never before been in the North Seas, so I was not accustomed to such dark gloomy weather--not but what it is bad enough in the English Channel now and then--still it does not often last so long as it does up in the north.

Day after day the clouds hung down over our heads, and the wind howled, and the dark green seas kept leaping up around, as if eager to draw us down under their angry foaming bosoms. We had a hard matter to cook our provisions, and no very easy one to eat them raw or cooked. Suddenly the wind shifted and blew as strongly as ever from the eastward, and then from the northward, and then got back again into the old quarter, and the master confessed that, for the life of him he could not tell where he had drifted to.

"On which side of Shetland are we, do you think?" said I.

"I only hope that we are still to the eastward, but at all events I believe we are well away to the northward of the islands."

"I hope so," I answered. "But look, captain, what huge and unbroken seas come rolling in from the west; if we are not to the northward, it is my opinion that we have got the islands under our lee, and if this gale is to continue, I would rather have them anywhere else than there."

"So would I, young man; but I have made this trip pretty often, and I don't think that I can be so far out in my calculation," was the answer.

All I could say was that I hoped that I was wrong and he was right, as, whichever was the case, there was nothing we could do till the weather moderated. On we drove. I did not like the look of things. When night came on I did not turn in, but sat down below out of the cold, ready to spring on deck in a moment. I had fastened my money in a belt round my waist, and kept my shoes ready to kick off, and my jacket loose to throw easily aside. I was certain that the vessel would be wrecked. I felt no fear for my own life, though I remembered my rash oath and what had occurred so often before, and the gloomy weather had indeed increased the conviction that I was under a sort of curse, and that I should have no rest till it was fulfilled. I am just saying what I then thought. I cannot even now be surprised at the idea gaining such powerful possession of my mind, while everything that had happened to me had tended to strengthen it.

Night came on. Pitchy darkness surrounded the storm-driven little smack. The cry of "Breakers! breakers!" and piercing shrieks made me spring on deck. At that moment the vessel struck. The foaming seas came hissing and roaring up after her. We were among a dark ma.s.s of rocks; no fabric formed by human hands could have withstood the violence of those terrific waves. I held on to the last moment, while the huge foaming seas washed over my head, almost drowning me, as I clung to the wreck. Then I felt the deck quiver and shake, and the stout beams and timbers were wrenched and torn asunder under my feet, and I was hurled onward among the broken fragments by a roaring sea, which must have well-nigh completed the destruction of the craft. I lost all consciousness.

My last thought had been that at length the angry sea was about to claim me as a victim. There was a hissing, roaring sound in my ears; I felt myself tossed to and fro, knocked and battered, but I made no attempt, that I am aware of, to save myself. At length I opened my eyes. It was daylight. Some men were bending over me.

I heard a voice say, "Here is one who seems to have still some life in him." And another person came and took my hand, and after waiting a minute, said, "Yes, carry him up to the house." And I was put on a litter and borne up a steep path among some cliffs; and then across a high, wild down till I reached a substantial, strongly-built stone house. The movement of the litter had a very good effect on me, so that by the time I reached the house, my chest was relieved from the salt water I had swallowed, and my senses had completely returned. I was therefore saved the ceremony, very common in those days, by which a good many people were killed, of hanging nearly drowned men up by the heels, under the idea that the water would more quickly run out of their mouths. I was carried into a large boarded room, out of which several others opened. In one of those there was a bed. After my wet clothes had been taken off me I was placed in bed, carefully wrapped up in blankets, and directly after some warm drink was brought me.

I remember struggling somewhat when I found my money-belt being removed, and trying to possess myself of it.

"Never fear, young man; it will be all safe," said a voice. "We are not wreckers, and we no longer fancy that you will work us harm because we help to save your life."

This satisfied me. I knew that there were honest people as well as rogues in the world, but I had often met with honest ones, so I hoped that I had now fallen among such. One thing, at all events, was very evident, they seemed anxious to save my life. After this I fell into a sound sleep.

It was nine o'clock in the evening when I awoke; but the summer days are very long in those regions, and even then the evening sun was shining into the window. A stout, white-haired, kindly-looking old gentleman came in to see me with a younger man, whom I took to be his son, and a servant girl brought in a tray with some tea, and some barley scones, hot and b.u.t.tered. I thought that I had never tasted anything nicer in my life.

"I hope you are better now after your sleep, young man," said the old gentleman. "If fever can be kept off, I think you will do well; but we have sent for the doctor to look at your hurts. There are two or three other people who want his aid."

"What, only two or three escaped out of all those on board the smack?"

said I.

"It is a mercy that any one came on sh.o.r.e alive; and you will say so when you see the place in day-time," said the younger man.

"We won't speak about it at present," said the old gentleman. "The less he talks or hears others talk, the better just now. We bid you good-night. Sleep again, if you can; some one will look in on you to see how you are going on, now and then."

With these words my hospitable friends left me once more to myself.

I suspected, indeed, that I should be better for a doctor's care, for I felt that I had been bruised and battered dreadfully; my head had been bandaged, and when I tried to stir I found all my limbs sore and stiff,--indeed, it was not without great pain that I could move either an arm or a leg. I slept through most of the night. When I did awake, I began to wonder where I had got to, for the old gentleman had remained in the room so short a time, that I had not been able to ask any questions.

I had little doubt that I had been cast away on the coast of Shetland, but whether on the northern or southern end I could not tell, any more than I could who was my kind host.

The next day the doctor arrived. He had ridden over from Lerwick, with only the rest of half-an-hour for his steed, he said; so I knew that I must be at some distance from that town, and yet on the big island called the mainland. He dressed my wounds and bruises, and told me that one or two of my ribs were broken, but that I might consider myself fortunate that matters were no worse; and remarked that he had no doubt I had lived a prudent, careful life, as I was perfectly free from all signs of fever, which would not otherwise have been the case; and then giving me some bottles of medicine to take, he left me to look after his other patients. He spent two or three days in the house, for the islands are generally so healthy that there was not much demand for his services elsewhere.

One of my poor shipmates died, I was told, from his hurts. I rapidly got better. Besides the old gentleman and his son and the doctor, an old lady looked in now and then to see me. She was a very neat, pretty old woman, so cheerful and cheery, always having something pleasant to say, so that she contributed much to raise my spirits. I will say that I was most thankful for all the mercies which had been shown me, and for my preservation from so great a danger.

At last I was p.r.o.nounced well enough and strong enough to get up and appear in public. A barber, who was going his rounds, came in, and shaved me and cut my hair, and my head and face were all to rights, so that I looked as well as ever, only my ribs hurt me a little, and my limbs felt somewhat stiff.

The old gentleman came to my room when I was ready. "Take my arm," said he kindly; "you will find it rather strange walking at first, and your knees will shake a little."

I could not refuse his kind offer, though I thought that I could have walked very well by myself. He led me into the large hall, and there, seated by a window at the further end, looking out on the sea, I observed two young women. One was dressed in black, the other in some sober colour or other. They were both at the moment bending down over their knitting, and talking in a low voice to each other, so that they did not observe our entrance.

We had got three-quarters of the way across the room, and the old gentleman was giving me a chair to sit down on, when the noise it made over the floor caused them to look up. There sat one I had so long thought of, whom I had come to search for, Margaret Troall.

She looked at me in a strange, bewildered way, still she knew me, and yet she could not believe her senses. She tried to rise from her chair to come towards me, but something seemed to keep her back. She drew her breath quickly, as if she would have wished to have spoken, but could not. I felt that I ought to speak first.

"They told you I was dead, Miss Margaret," said I, and I know my voice trembled very much, and I know that had I not leant on the chair I should have fallen. "They were mistaken; I went to Plymouth only lately, and found you were no longer there; and when I discovered that you had gone north, I came here to seek you."

She recovered herself while I was speaking, and rising from her seat, came up and gave me her hand. I do not say that there was anything very extraordinary in the action, but I know that it made me very happy. Her friends at first looked very much astonished; but a few words served to explain matters, and then they were doubly glad that they had had the opportunity of being of so much service to an old friend of their young relative.

I found that the name of my host, the uncle of Miss Troall, was David Angus, and that the place where the smack had been wrecked was in Saint Magnus Bay, in the parish of North Morven. My friends were the holders of one of the largest farms in the district, and lived in a very comfortable, though what people in the south would call a rough way. I am not going to talk of all that pa.s.sed between Margaret and me. I should not have believed that she had thought so much of me as she had done, it seemed; but our first meeting had been under peculiar circ.u.mstances. She had seen me mourning deeply for a lost relative, and she had discovered thus that I had a tender heart, so I may venture to say, and now my coming all the way north to look for her showed her that she had made no little impression on it.

Well, all that has pa.s.sed and gone. I got every day better and better, and was soon able to walk out with her along the tops of the high cliffs, and to visit the wild scenes to be found especially in that part of the island. I especially remember one place we visited, called the Navis Grind. It is a gap in the cliffs formed by the whole force of the western ocean rolling against them during a succession of heavy gales, age after age, till vast fragments of the rock have been forced in for hundreds of yards over the downs, and now lie like the fragments of some ruined city scattered over the plain. We delighted in returning to those scenes of wild grandeur, because they contrasted so strongly with our own quiet happiness.