for Ranald to escort her to the house on the pretext which he had found—and indeed impossible, for the young lady thereupon practically dismissed him. Yet she did not rebuff him when he said that he would wait upon her uncle on the morrow, though she returned a non-committal reply when he expressed a hope that he might find her at home, too.
But as Bride Stewart, holding the deerhound by the collar, was borne away across the strip of water she smiled at him—that was something. It was at this very spot by the ferry that he had had his last glimpse of her a year ago last spring, he and Malcolm Robertson, after that unpleasant encounter of hers with the MacGregor from Glen Lyon in the wood on the slope. Naturally Miss Stewart had made no reference to that episode, and equally naturally Ranald would have been the very last to base upon it any claim to gratitude, having acted on that occasion merely as any man must have done. But had it in her mind the aspect of even a spider’s thread of a link between them? He would probably never know.
(4)
The window was open that evening to the long July twilight; and it was an evening so quiet that the fall of a cone from the ranks of sentinel firs outside the front of Inchrannoch House had the importance of an event. It was light enough to read still, and, Uncle Walter being absorbed in his book, Bride’s needle began to ply slower and slower until it ceased from its task altogether, and she was gazing abstractedly at some rosy feathers of cloud which the flushed west, invisible from this room, had sent to drift towards the summit of Schiehallion.
Was it possible that thinking of a person had some effect upon their movements? For a year and four months—she could not deny it to herself—the image of the dark, lean traveller from Dunkirk had remained as fresh as though she had possessed a picture of him—no, fresher, because it could move and speak in her memory. And she knew that was because she had often thought about him, though with no hope of seeing him again—just as a dweller on a remote sea-loch might recall, even to its spars and rigging, a chance ship which had put in there where ships seldom came. And now the same vessel had sailed once more into the uneventful waters of her life.
How was she to know whether he had meant anything particular by that little speech at the ferry about her friendship? Perhaps he was accustomed to say such things, with just that earnestness, to any young lady who took his fancy—though somehow one would not easily think that. Yet how could one know? He was an absolute stranger in Rannoch, even to Malcolm Robertson, who had first brought him to her uncle’s house. But she would very much like to believe that he had meant what he had said.
Fiona got up from her place near Mr. Stewart’s chair and came and put her muzzle on Bride’s knee. “I wish you could tell me, Fiona,” thought her mistress as she stroked it.
The deerhound’s movement caused her uncle to look up and then lay down his book. “If you are not sewing any more, my dear, I should be obliged if you would read to me awhile—that is, if this light is good enough for you. I’d not have you try your young eyes to save mine.”
Bride rose at once and took the book. “’Tis full light enough for me here by the window, Uncle Walter,” she said, with her accustomed sweetness. “Is this the place?”
But it is quite possible to read aloud—read intelligently—and think of something else as well.
CHAPTER VI
It was very misty next afternoon when Ranald went to pay his respects at Inchrannoch—misty and cold. For Mr. Stewart’s sake there was a fire. He had not been well of late, and the death of his wife, if not unexpected, had greatly shaken him. After about twenty minutes of talk he suddenly fell into a doze, though he was still sitting upright in his chair.
“You must excuse him, sir,” said Bride in a low voice. “It happens thus at times. When he wakes he will be distressed at his discourtesy to a guest.”
“Perhaps,” hazarded Ranald, equally low, “he will not realise that he has slept.”
It seemed to join them in a bond, this hushed colloquy in the firelight; the mist without also joined them, shutting them off together from the world. Miss Stewart glanced at the window.
“You will never experience haar like this at Girolac, Mr. Maclean.”
“My sorrow that I shall not, madam!”
“You mean that you will regret it?” questioned she in a whisper. “But in its place you will have the sun, and I suppose much of it—more than we ever see here!”
He looked at her sitting there, nun-like, in a little sober grey gown—no, blend of nun and sidhe. “It will not be the sun of my own country.”
Bride clasped her hands on her knee. “And yet you must go?”
“If I am to accept my uncle’s legacy, Miss Stewart, I cannot continue to live in Scotland and leave the care of the estate to a deputy—not, at any rate, for many years yet.”
“You expect then to be absent from Scotland for a long while?”
“For a long while.”
“And you are going alone,” she pursued in the same hushed voice, “taking no one with you—not even a servant?”
“Quite alone, Miss Stewart. It is exile; could I impose it on another who like myself loves the wind down the corrie and the burn in spate?”
There was a silence. The old man still slept, his head a little fallen forward; the fire flickered, the mist pressed on the window-panes, and Fiona, stretched at Bride’s feet, gave a deep sigh. And Bride herself, though her eyes were fixed on the fire, knew that the guest was looking at her very intently.
At last he said slowly, with little pauses between the phrases: “When I have been in France a while, and have learnt how pleasant a land it is . . . and that indeed I know already, since I was there two years ago at vintage time—perhaps I may have gained a sufficiently persuasive tongue to paint its praises to . . . to the one person whom I would have share its sunlight with me. Nevertheless, even so, I fear that would be too much to ask . . . from a Highlander.”
Still Bride looked into the fire, at the flames branching like a deer’s antlers—the antlers of a stag thrusting horns of lightning all round the charred wood. Her thoughts went flickering with them, now here, now there. . . .
“You cannot tell that, sir, until you try.” Had she really said that?
“But what if I am afraid to try?” he answered, almost inaudibly; and then was silent.
She stole a look at him again; but he, too, was gazing at the fire now. Yet she could see that he was frowning.
“Does your friend know of your intention?” she hazarded. One of them must say something; the silence was too difficult. Her heart was beating in a strange fashion—an unaccountable fashion, for what were Mr. Maclean’s future plans to her?
But the answer to the question which she had put to him she was destined not to hear. Those lithe, twisting antlers of flame played her a sorry trick, for through their agency a piece of half-burnt log just then subsided with a crash sufficient to break Mr. Stewart’s light slumber, impervious though it had been to the murmur of voices. He woke with a start, but seemed indeed not to know that he had been asleep.
“You were saying, Mr. Maclean, that in the district of Bordeaux the vines——”
The moment was gone; and none like it recurred during the brief remainder of Ranald Maclean’s visit.
* * * * *
The mist seemed denser than ever when he left Inchrannoch House; old Donald was even inclined to grumble at having to ferry him across the river. It was not so thick, however, as to hinder progress if one knew the way, and Ranald set out eastwards on the four miles or so to Mount Alexander with the