Chapter VIII: Saltcoats

The two fugitives fled from the Manse, and crossed over the moor, and went down to the road leading to Saltcoats, in very diverse moods. The Whaup made light of the affair of the crucifix, and laughed at it as a good joke. Coquette was more thoughtful, and a trifle angry.

"It is too much," she said. "I am not in the habit to make enemies, and I cannot live like this--to be looked at as something very bad. If I do not know the feelings of your country about music, about Sunday, about religion--and it seems even a crime that I shall be cheerful at times--why not tell me instead of to scold? I will do what they want, but I will not be treated like a child. It is too much--this Leesiebess, and her harsh voice, and her scolding. It is too much--it is not bearable--it is a beastly shame!"

"A what?" said the Whaup.

"A beastly shame," she repeated, looking at him rather timidly.

The Whaup burst into a roar of laughter.

"Is it not right?" she said. "Papa did use to say that when he was indignant."

"Oh, it is intelligible enough," said the Whaup, "quite intelligible; but young ladies in this country do not say such things."

"I will remember," said Coquette, obediently.

The Whaup now proceeded to point out to his companion that, after all, there was a good deal to be said on the side of Leezibeth and her husband Andrew. Coquette, he said, had given them some cause to complain. The people of the Manse--whom Coquette took to represent the people of the country--were as kind-hearted as people anywhere else; but they had their customs, their beliefs, their prejudices, to which they clung tenaciously, just like people elsewhere; and, especially, in this matter of the crucifix, she had wounded their feelings by introducing into a Protestant Manse the emblem of a religion which they regarded with horror.

"But why is it that you regard any religion with horror?" said Coquette. "If it is religion, I do think it cannot be much wicked! If you do bring some Protestant emblem into my Catholic church I shall not grumble--I would say, we all believe in the one God--you may have a share of my bench--you may pray just beside me--and we all look to the one Father who is kind to us."

The Whaup shook his head.

"That is a dangerous notion; but I cannot argue with you about it. Everything you say, everything you do, is somehow so natural, and fitting, and easy, that it seems it must be right. It is all a part of yourself, and all so perfect that nobody would have it altered, even if you were wrong."

"You do say that?" said Coquette, with a blush of pleasure.

"That sort of vague religious sentiment you talk of would be contemptible in anybody else, you know," said the Whaup, frankly--"it would show either weakness of reasoning or indifference; but in you it is something that makes people like you. Why, I have watched you again and again in the parlour at the Manse; and whether you let your hand rest on the table, or whether you look out of the window, or whether you come near the fire, you are always easy and graceful. It is a gift you have of making yourself, without knowing it, a picture. When you came out just now, I thought that grey woolly shawl round your shoulders was pretty; and since you have put it round your head, it is quite charming. You can't help it. And so you can't help that light and cheerful way of looking at religion, and of being happy and contented, and of making yourself a pleasure to the people round about you."

Coquette began to laugh; and the Whaup came to an uncomfortable stop in the midst of his rapid enthusiasm.

"When you talk like that," she said, "I think I am again in France, I am so gay-hearted. You approve of me, then?" she added, timorously.

Approve of her! Was it possible that she could care for his approval? And in what language could he express his opinion of her save in the only poetry familiar to Airlie Manse?--"The King's daughter is all glorious within: her clothing is of wrought gold. She shall be brought unto the King in raiment of needlework: the virgins her companions that follow her shall be brought unto thee. With gladness and rejoicing shall they be brought: they shall enter into the King's palace." Only, this King's daughter was without companions--she was all alone--and the Whaup wondered how this pure and strange jewel came to be dropped in the centre of a Scotch moor.

The wind was blowing hard from the south-west--the region of rain. Arran was invisible; and in place of the misty peaks there was a great wall of leaden-grey sky, from the base of which came lines and lines of white waves, roaring in to the shore. Coquette drew her thick plaid more closely around her, and pressed on; for St. Nazaire now lay underneath them--a dark line of houses between the sea and the land.

"What is that woman," said Coquette, looking along the road, "who stands with the flowers in her hand, and her hair flying? Is she mad? Is she Ophelia come to Scotland?"

Mad enough the girl looked; for as they came up to her, they found her a bonnie Scotch lassie of sixteen or seventeen, who sobbed at intervals, and kept casting tearful glances all around her. She carried in one hand her bonnet, in the other a bunch of flowers; and the wind that had scattered the flowers, and left but a remnant in her hand, had also unloosed her nut-brown hair, and blown it in tangled masses about her face and neck. She stood aside, in a shamed way, to let the strangers pass; but the Whaup stopped.

"What is the matter wi' ye, lass?" said he.

"I had my shoon and stockings in my bundle," she said, while the tears welled up in her blue eyes, "and I hae dropped them out; and I canna gang back the road to look for them, for I maun be in Saltcoats afore kye-time."

"What does she say?" asked Coquette.

"She has only lost her shoes and stockings, that's all," said the Whaup.

"But it is bad enough for her, I dare say."

In an instant Coquette had out her purse--a dainty little Parisian thing, in mother-of-pearl, with filagree work round it--and taken therefrom two Napoleons.

"Here," she said, going forward to the girl, "you must not cry more about that. Take my little present, and you will buy more shoes and more stockings for yourself."

The girl eyed the money with some dismay; and probably wondered if this was not a temptress who had suddenly appeared to offer her gold, and who spoke with a strange sound in her voice.

"Dinna be a sumph!" said the Whaup, who could talk broadly enough when occasion demanded. "Take the money the leddy offers ye, and thank her for't."

The girl accepted the foreign-looking coins, and seemed much distressed that--like the peasantry of Scotland in general--she did not know how to express the gratitude she felt. Her thanks were in her eyes, and these spoke eloquently. But, just as her benefactors were moving on, a man came along the road with something dangling from his hands. Great was the joy of the girl on perceiving that he had found her lost property; and, when he had come up and delivered the things to her, she advanced with the money to Coquette.

"Thank ye, mem," said she.

"Won't you keep the money, and buy something for your little brothers and sisters, if you have any?"

This offer was declined, with just an inkling of pride in the girl's manner; and the next instant she was hurrying to Saltcoats as fast as her bare feet could cany her.

Now, this incident had delayed the two runaways much longer than they suspected; and, when they got down to Saltcoats, they were much later than they dreamed. Indeed, they never looked at the town clock in passing, so satisfied were they that they had plenty of time.

"This is not like St. Nazaire," said Coquette, decidedly.

"You have not seen it yet," returned the Whaup, just as confidently.

A few minutes afterwards Coquette and he stood upon the shore. The long bay of Saltcoats, sweeping round from the far promontory of Troon, fronted a heaving, tumbling mass of white-crested waves, that came rolling onward from under a great leaden breadth of sky; and, as they gazed out on this wintry-looking sea, they had on their right hand the grey stone wall of the town, which projected into the water, with here and there a crumbling old house peeping over it. The church spire rose above the tallest of the houses, and aided the perspective--so much so that it was almost possible to imagine that the site of the building had been chosen by one who had studied the picturesque opportunities of the place.

"It is St. Nazaire in winter!" cried Coquette, her voice half lost in the roar of the waves.

"Didn't I tell you?" triumphantly shouted the Whaup, who had never seen St. Nazaire, but only knew that, on this side, Saltcoats looked singularly like a little French walled town. "Now will you come and see the harbour?"

But she would not leave. She stood there, with her shawl fluttering in the fierce wind, and with her slight form scarcely able to withstand the force of the hurricane, looking out on the rushing white crests of the waves, on the black line of the town perched above the rocks, and on the lowering western sky, which seemed to be slowly advancing with its gloom. There was no sign of life near them--not even a sailor on the watch, nor a ship running before the gale--nothing but the long and level shore, and the great wild mass of waves, which had a voice like thunder far out beyond the mere dashing on the beach.

"Imagine what it would be," she said, "to have one you loved out in a fearful storm, and for you to come down here at night to hear the savage message that the waves bring. It would make me mad. You will not go to sea?" she added suddenly, turning to him with an urgent pleading in her face and her voice.

"No--of course not," he said, looking strangely at her.

Was it possible, then, that this vague determination of his had lingered in her mind as a sort of threat? Did she care to have him remain near her?

"Come," said he, "we must hurry, if you mean to look at the harbour and the old ruins at the point. Besides, I want you to rest for a minute or two at an inn here, and you shall see whether there is no _vin ordinaire_ in the country except at Earlshope."

"Earlshope--Earlshope," she said. "Why do you talk always of Earlshope?"

The Whaup would not answer, but led her back through the town, and stopped on their way to the harbour at the Saracen's Head. Here Coquette had a biscuit and a glass of claret; and was further delighted to perceive that the window of the room they were in looked out upon a very French-looking courtyard of stone, surrounded by a high wall which appeared to front the sea.

"It is St. Nazaire in winter," she repeated; "the grey stones, the windy sea, the chill air. Yet how dark it becomes!"

Indeed, when they had resumed their journey, and gone out to the point beyond the little harbour, the gale had waxed much more fierce. They passed through the ruins of what seemed an ancient fortress on to the rocks, and found themselves alone in front of the sea, which had now become of a lurid green. It was, in fact, much lighter in colour than the sombre sky above; and the grey-green waves, tumbling in white, could be seen for an immense distance under this black canopy of cloud. The wind whistled around them, and dashed the spray into their blinded eyes. The wildness of the scene--the roaring of wind and sea around--produced a strange excitement in the girl; and while she clung to the Whaup's arm to steady herself on the rocks, she laughed aloud in defiance of the storm. At this moment a glare of steel-blue light flashed through the driving gloom in front of them; and almost simultaneously there was a rattle of thunder overhead, which reverberated far and long among the Arran hills. Then came the rain; and they could hear the hissing of it on the sea before it reached them.

"Shall we make for the town?" cried the Whaup, "or shelter ourselves in the ruins?"

He had scarcely spoken when another wild glare burst before their eyes, and made them stagger back; while the rattle of the thunder seemed all around their ears.

"Are you hurt?" said Coquette, for her companion did not speak.

"I think not," said the Whaup; "but my arm tingles up to the elbow, and I can scarcely move it. This is close work. We must hide in the ruins, or you will be wet through."

They went inside the old building; and crept down and sat mute and expectant under Coquette's outstretched plaid. All around them was the roaring of the waves, with the howling of the gusts of wind and rain; and ever and anon the rough stone walls before them would be lit up by a flash of blue lightning, which stunned their eyes for several seconds.

"This is a punishment that we ran away," said Coquette.

"Nonsense!" said the Whaup. "This storm will wreck many a boat; and it would be rather hard if a lot of sailors should be drowned merely to give us a drouking."

"What is that?"

"A wetting, such as we are likely to get. Indeed, I don't think there is much use in stopping here; for it will soon be so dark that we shall not be able to get along the rocks to the shore."

This consideration made them rise and leave at once; and sure enough it had grown very dark within the past half-hour. Night was rapidly approaching as they made their way through Saltcoats to gain the road to Airlie. Nor did the storm abate one jot of its fury; and long before they had begun to ascend towards the moorland country, the Whaup was as wet as though he had been lying in a river. Coquette's thick plaid saved her somewhat.

"What shall we do?" she said. "They will be very angry, and this time they have reason."

"I shouldn't care whether they were angry or not," said the Whaup, "if only you were at home and in dry clothes."

"But you are wetter than I am."

"But I don't care," said the Whaup, although his teeth were chattering in his head.

So they struggled on, in the darkness, and wind, and driving rain, until it seemed to Coquette that the way under foot was strangely spongy and wet. She said nothing, however, until the Whaup exclaimed, in a serious voice--

"We are off the road, and on the moor somewhere."

Such was the fact. They had got up to the high land only to find themselves lost in a morass, with no means of securing the slightest guidance. There was nothing for it but to blunder on helplessly through the dark, trusting to find some indication of their whereabouts. At last they came to an enclosure and a footpath; and as they followed this, hoping to reach the Airlie road, they came upon a small house, which had a light in its windows.

"It is Earlshope Lodge," said the Whaup. "And there are the gates."

"Oh, let us go in and beg for some shelter," said Coquette, whose courage had forsaken her the moment she found they had lost their way.

"You may," said a voice from the mass of wet garments beside her, "you may go in, and get dry clothes, if you like; but I will not."