Patsy by Samuel Rutherford Crockett (read aloud TXT) 📖

fault was his own.
Besides, he would have given the same answer then or any other moment. He had not been taken by surprise. So long as he was Patsy's husband, nobody else could be so also! Why, of course, he would stand by his bargain! What else was he for--he, Diarmid Garland's second son--the head of the Bands, the famous defier of the press and the Preventives? Pshaw! What did all that mean to him now--apples of Sodom in the mouth, an exceeding bitter fruit! What a fool he was with his airs! Would he ever have such a chance again, and he to dream of complaining!
Gradually he became conscious of Whitefoot moving, silent as a shadow, beside his master. Once, when Stair stood a long time on the craggy top of the Fell of Rathan, gazing out at the ranged lights on the English side of the firth, he was conscious of a cool, damp nose thrusting its way into his palm, causing him to open his hand by little calculated snout-pushes and burrowings. Whitefoot was sympathetic. Whitefoot felt for the trouble of his master, though he could not understand it, and Whitefoot would not be satisfied till his friend's hand was resting on his head. Even then little heavings and sidelong pushes expressed a desire to be caressed, and when at last Stair's hand ran over his head, across the thick ruff of hair about his neck and passed down his spine, Whitefoot shook with delight and leaped so high that his forepaws were on Stair's shoulders.
"Down, dog, down!" said his master, and at the word Whitefoot dropped back on all fours, obedient but content.
It now was past the hour of twelve. The central night stood still. The little chill breeze which ruffles the waves an hour or so in early morning had not yet begun to blow. Stair had been about the House of Rathan half-a-dozen of times. At last he went into the barn and, only removing his coat, he threw himself at length among the straw of which he had made a couch earlier in the evening. Whitefoot nuzzled comfortably up against him. He did not mean to sleep. It would soon be morning and there were the cows out in the little meadows. He would only close his eyes for a moment.
It will not be surprising to learn that the next sound he heard was a happy laugh, as Patsy appeared at the open door of the barn with "Awake, thou sluggard" upon her lips.
"I looked in half-an-hour ago," she laughed, "and you looked so sweet and peaceful that I went and milked the cows before wakening you."
"You milked the cows?"
Patsy nodded her head with its tight cover of curls, all of densest black, shapely and boyish.
"The milk is in the dairy!" she said. "Concerning what else does my lord please to inquire?"
"But the two cows?" he said, hastily getting up and putting on his coat, which he had spread over him, "they ought not to be left out all day on the high grass. Cruising sloops of war, and even Preventive men with spy-glasses, might easily see them from the shore."
"I had thought of that, my lord," said Patsy. "I confined them with a good reach of rope behind the old fold which lies hidden out of sight in the hollow of the island. No one can see them there, unless they mount on the cliffs and look down on them from the height of the island. They will be happy there, for the rabbits and gulls have not spoilt the grass."
Stair stood up beside Patsy in the doorway of the barn. The gate of the yard was open, and they walked slowly towards it, splendid widths of sea and heights of cloudless heaven opening out before them at every step. Instinctively Patsy caught Stair by the arm, gave it a little joyous tug, and cried out, "Oh, Stair, was ever anything so beautiful?"
The young man glanced down at her. But her eyes were on the distant, tender blue of the coast about Whitehaven, and the Isle of Man hovering in a mother-of-pearl haze, like a dream-island about to alight. All his instincts told him to clasp her to him and take the consequences. But unfortunately Stair reasoned, which is the wrong method with a woman, especially with such a Pictish daughter of impulse as Patsy Ferris. He remembered what she had said to him the night before, as if that could have any bearing on her mood of to-day.
But so the chance passed. The fine morning gold was dimmed. They had looked too long. Patsy released his arm and they fell apart.
She remembered it was time to go indoors for breakfast. They went, their eyes averted, lest the other should see the remains of the morning glory. They kept silence also lest the thrill of it should tremble in their voices. But at the sight of the spread table and the homely scents of fried bacon and smoked mutton ham, Patsy became again very human, and set herself down in the place of house-mistress with a ripple of glad laughter.
"Only think, Stair!" she cooed low in her throat, "here all by ourselves--a breakfast which I have prepared, eggs which I have found, milk which I drew from the cow--(they are two such nice cows, Stair!), and you and Whitefoot sitting opposite! Just ourselves two, Stair. Not a chaperon--not a _gouvernante_, like the old horror the Princess used to threaten me with. No felt-footed lacqueys always bringing you the wrong thing, no Princess, no Miss Aline even! Oh, I declare I am so glad--that I could--_take my breakfast!_"
Patsy broke off suddenly, making a wilful anti-climax to her speech, and, as Stair knew very well, not in the least finishing as she had meant to. But her housekeeping pride was aroused. He must eat. She would heap his plate. She had heard him late last night moving about. Had he not slept well? That was why she had let him sleep on this morning, but he must not expect such indulgence every day. He would need to be out and at the net fishing or among the flounders, for though they had plenty for the present in their store-room, they did not know when they might be succoured.
Then Stair put a question he had been thirsting to have answered all night.
"Whose is this island, and who has given us the right to use all the larder and live-stock?"
Patsy clapped her hands gleefully.
"Guess!" she cried--"three guesses!"
"_One_, wrong--no, not my father! _Two_, wrong, not Uncle Ju! THREE, WRONG--not Miss Aline! You made me gasp that time. I thought you could not miss it. We are here on this Island of Rathan as caretakers for Mr. Kennedy McClure. These are his cows. His sheep are on the heuchs yonder, and we have liberty to kill them for mutton when we weary of fish. These are his hens I let out this morning, and he brought Jean here with selected stores to make everything cosy for us!"
"And why does he do all this?" Stair inquired. Patsy flung up her head and smiled dazzlingly.
"Who knows?" she said. "He was great friends with me in London. He made the _Good Intent_ hurry up when I was ready--otherwise you might have stayed a long time in prison. And this is better, eh, Stair?"
"And your Uncle Julian--Mr. Wemyss? Will they not be harder on him because I have escaped?"
"You have not escaped--you have been carried off," Patsy corrected. "So was Uncle Ju. He walked off the step of his verandah into the arms of Captain Penman and half-a-dozen of the crew of the _Good Intent_. They seized him and carried him on the _Billy Goat_, which sailed immediately for parts unknown. But Joseph managed so well and the orders from headquarters were so strict, that the garrison did not even loot the house as they did at Cairn Ferris, that night when you disgraced us all by drawing royal blood at the White Loch. Here are some books which he sent for you--some from the Bothy, and some for me to read. I am not so learned as you, and Joseph chose accordingly. If we have wet days, Stair, we can read all day with our toes to the fire!"
"And why did not we also go on the _Good Intent_ and so get away from all this trouble?" Stair inquired.
"If you wanted Uncle Ju all day telling us what his Princess would have thought, said and done--I did not. I wanted to be by our own two selves. Besides, if we were to get married, there is no country in the world where it can be done with such willingness and alacrity as at home. Also I have been brought up a good Presbyterian, and a parish minister and his session clerk--well, where in foreign parts will you find the like of Mr. Duff and honest James Fraser? The _Good Intent_, indeed! I think you are hard to please if you are not content with your present quarters, young man!"


CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE LAND OF ALWAYS AFTERNOON
By the afternoon of the second day Stair was finding himself unfit for human society, because he had not been able to shave since he left the prison. Of course he had brought nothing with him. There was no time. His hand went unconsciously every other minute to his scrubby chin. In truth, his Norse blondness did not allow it to show as much as he supposed. But that did not detract from the pervading sensation of disgustful grubbiness.
Patsy's eyes missed nothing, and very soon she surprised him by opening the door of a little tower chamber on the ground floor, sparsely but quite sufficiently furnished.
"I should feel very much safer," she said, "if you were to sleep within the house. You will find shaving materials in the corner!"
Stair could not thank her, but then neither did his accursed pride rise up in rebellion. She closed the door and left him alone. The water in the jug was hot. In a case marked "A. F." were razors and other necessities. Evidently Patsy had done some plundering, and had not come to him altogether without a dowry, though she had managed to do without the paternal benediction.
It was wonderful to feel clean again, to get the stubble off his cheeks, and to plash the cool water over his head and about his ears. When he had finished he felt measurably nearer to Patsy. He found laid out also clean shirts and neckcloths. Two complete suits of clothes were folded in an open chest of drawers. Patsy had evidently looted to some purpose.
Stair's first instinct was not to put on any of these things till he had been assured that they were there with the consent of Adam Ferris. But he realized that he had already used the razors, and besides it would be idiotic, in his present awkward position, to strain at any gnats after swallowing such a camel as the marriage on the Colvend shore.
Besides, he had the sense to see that any obstinacy would terribly offend Patsy. She had evidently thought much about the matter, and whether her father knew or did not know was secondary to the great need in Stair's heart of making Patsy happy. He did not, however, realize how long had been her thoughts on the subject, or that the suits of clothes which he supposed to have been lifted from her father's drawers, had been talked over by Patsy and Kennedy McClure in the garden at Hanover Lodge, ordered at a first-class London tailor's, with such approximate indications as size, height, and general proportionateness of body could supply. Patsy had paid for them