The Silver Darlings (66 page)

The earth was very still in those long summer nights that never grew quite dark, still, and full of a peace, a waiting, a green light, queerly alive, like something
hearkening
. The sea rushed and was tumultuous, or lay
glittering
in the sun, its waters clear, its depth known. Here was the stillness of mystery, like God’s thought, or the reverie that comes upon a woman with a child in her lap.

Finn wanted his mind to be at peace.

And all the Knoll said to him was that it would not be at peace until he had cleansed it of a certain haunting misery.
Cleanse it of that, and all the seven seas are yours. But Finn knew as much himself and did not thank the Knoll. The longer he stayed here, the stronger this knowledge grew, the more pointed its thought, until Finn could not bear it any longer and got up and walked away. It was the first time the House of Peace had failed him.

So completely had it failed him that he could not go home and in a desire to get away altogether from his human kind, he struck up the neighbouring strath and ultimately came out on the moors among the sheep. He took the lonely ways, looking every now and then over his shoulder like a sheep-stealer. As he came down at last upon some scattered croft houses, he began to skulk, and spy, and slip on like a hunted criminal, until, breathing heavily, he gained the shelter of the Birch Wood and threw himself down, out of sight of the path.

His wretchedness now was gall in his mouth, bitter as poison. He shut his eyes and ground his teeth and tried to blot himself out, blot out the burning shame he had of
himself
for behaving with such utter and appalling weakness. For it was no good hiding the truth from himself any longer. Jim had come up from Wick for the new fishing season. That was all.

This sort of behaviour destroyed a man’s manhood. It destroyed him inside, in the places of his spirit. It made a wretched mess of him, and instead of turning away from it he could not leave it alone; had to turn back, nosing it out, like a dog.

But there was one positive point, with the prospect of relief in it. Once he was sure, dead sure of a real
relationship
between Una and Jim, then he could cleanse his mind finally. He could and he would! he swore, the skulking feeling of insecurity heavy upon him. He would finally be rid of the whole damned mess. Deep in the dark centres, he felt unclean and ashamed.

Voices in the distance coming up the path through the wood. He could hear Jim’s laugh.

Jim and Donnie and Meg. Not a fourth voice. Then there was a fourth voice. The voice of Betz, sounding sarcastic and sullen.

“What about going and rooting her out?” asked Jim.

“I’m going home,” said Betz.

“I must say you’re a pleasant one,” declared Jim.

“The same to you,” said Betz. “Stop it! Good night.”

When the girls had gone, Jim asked, “I wonder why the hell Una didn’t come to-night?”

“I don’t know I’m sure,” said Donnie. “Perhaps she couldn’t get away.”

“Did Meg say anything?”

“No.”

“She did,” said Jim. “I know by your voice. You must …”

As the voices receded, Finn raised his face and the marks of small twigs were bitten deep into his forehead.

He sat up and stared like one whose mind was wandering. Then he went to the edge of the wood and gazed after the two girls, who seemed to be going direct to Una’s house which was the nearest and not very far away.

Round the gable-end came Una and her mother, and Finn heard greetings and laughter. The mother was sent inside and the two girls helped Una to carry some wool dyed a vivid blue over to a low turf wall. But they did not start spreading the wool to dry. Meg had too much to say, and her body swayed every now and then with high laughter. To be working so late—for it was nearly eleven o’clock—to complete a task was nothing unusual at this time of the year. Presumably Una, who had been busy and was now getting the news, had been unable to go with the girls to spend the evening visiting friends.

When the fun was over, Una would not allow the others to soil their best clothes over a job that would take her no time, and after two or three false starts, Meg and Betz actually departed.

Una was down now at the little wall all alone spreading
the blue wool. He watched the movements of her hands and arms and saw her dark head. The birds had stopped
singing
, except for a corncrake in a little field over on the left. The night was very quiet and the light a dim green. Una kept working all the time, with never a sound from her, down there by the little wall. Finn wet his lips and let out a low clear whistle. As Una looked up, he walked out just clear of the trees, stood still, and beckoned.

He saw her face whiten as she started back. He heard the smothered cry. “Una!” he called, loud enough for her to hear. She stopped. He beckoned again. She stood staring at him, looked over her shoulder at her home, around her, and slowly returned to the wall. He beckoned her to come to the wood, come to the wood, where they would not be seen, his body standing still against the darkness of the trees.

She crossed the wall and went up towards him, but slowly, watching him, like a woman in a trance. As she came near and he saw her eyes, he stepped back into the shelter of the trees. She followed him and they met.

“Hullo, Una!” He looked into eyes that were still upon him—not shyly, but in a strange searching manner. Then her expression broke and she glanced away, her body twisting. She smiled. “I wondered who it was,” she said. She began to breathe heavily. “Phew! I’m tired,” and quite deliberately she sat down. She did not seem
self-conscious
or greatly concerned about his presence. “Oh, I’m tired,” she repeated, and threw herself down and turned over on her face.

Her neck was white beneath her black hair. His eye ran along her body to the blue stains on her bare legs and feet. He was profoundly moved by whatever had happened to her. For in her flesh, in her eyes, even in her awkward movements, there was the warm soft darkness of appeal, of grace, the emanation that haunted him, that would never leave him alone.

He sat down feeling remote from her, not knowing what
to do, but so near her that he touched her shoulder lightly, and murmured her name. Then he spoke more firmly. Was she crying? He lay beside her and listened. “Una,” he said into her hair.

“Leave me,” she muttered.

He sat up and waited; and presently, somewhat
shamefacedly
but not weeping, she sat up beside him. Her face was now hot with blood, her eyes deep. “You gave me a fright. I was not sure who you were.”

“Why, did you think I was someone else?”

At that she turned her head and looked at him, looked into his eyes, with an assessing woman’s look in the midst of her warm emotion, and looked away.

“Why don’t you answer?” asked Finn, losing his bearings.

“I’ll have to go,” she said, as if he had fallen out of her thought. “They’ll be wondering where I am.”

“Answer me: who did you think I was?”

“Why do you question me?”

“Never mind. I’m questioning you.”

“I’m going home.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Who’ll stop me?”

“I will.”

She laughed a queer note or two and got to her feet. But he stood in her way.

“Answer me,” he said.

“I will not answer you.”

“Answer me,” he said coldly, angrily, his expression drawn and inclined to quiver.

Not looking at him, she strode on. But though she was a well-built girl, Finn pinned her arms and broke her strength. In doing this he grew very excited; he forgot himself altogether, and kissed her hair and her ear. But when her strength was broken, he felt ashamed of what he had done, not only to her but to himself. His loss of
self-command
increased his deep misery and wretchedness. He
let his arms fall. “All right,” he said indifferently, yet with deep underlying enmity and anger. “You can go.”

But she continued to lie against him, breathing heavily.

“Why don’t you go?” he demanded, and put his palms against her shoulders. But she would not be shoved off. She gripped him, hiding her face. He felt its pressure against his neck.

As he gazed over her head, his eyes narrowed in an
intense
woodland look. Then he gazed at her hair. “Una,” he said in a low voice. She gripped him more strongly as if she felt what was coming. He pushed her head back
relentlessly
. She struggled against showing what he would find in her face. But he found it and the world went blind against her mouth.

Some time thereafter, as they lay side by side on the floor of the wood, they heard her mother cry her name.

“I’ll have to go,” she said. “They must wonder where I am.” The wonder lay warm in her voice and in the soft beauty of her face. She did not stir.

“Never mind them.”

“I must.” She smiled.

“Do you want to go?”

She glanced at him. “You’re a terrible one for
questions
.”

“You know it’s not that.”

“What then?”

“I cannot believe it. I want to be sure.”

“It was awful of you to think I would come for anyone else.”

“But—you said—you wondered who it was.”

“I wondered—if it-was you.”

“Did you think, then, it was someone else?”

“No.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Una!” called her mother anxiously.

Una watched her two fingers pick amid the little dead
stalks. “Once,” she said, “one night, I saw your face at our window. I saw it quite clearly—and then it vanished.”

“Did you?”

“Yes.”

“You must have got a terrible fright. What did you think?”

She did not answer. “To-night,
when
I
heard
my
name
called
—and looked up—and saw you standing still against the wood, with only your hand beckoning me——”

A small shiver went over Finn. “And still you came?”

She nodded.

CHAPTER XXVI

FINN IN THE HEART OF THE CIRCLE

“
I
t’s not the best of weather,” said the owner of the shipyard who had handed Finn back a pound as
luck-penny
.

“But good for her baptism,” answered Finn lightly.

“You’ll tell me how she does?”

“You can rest assured I’ll do that—one way or the other!”

The boat-builder laughed. “You’re a hardy lot out of Dunster. I’ll say that.”

“Nothing but the best for us,” answered Finn. And then with a swift smile, “That’s why I went to you.”

“Well, you didn’t go far wrong, my boy. The best that could be put in her is in her. And sea-knowledge besides.”

“I am well satisfied, thank you.” Finn turned and in the quiet voice of the skipper said, “Give way, boys.”

There was a stiff breeze blowing into Wick harbour, with dark clouds massing. But Finn’s crew were like horses before a race. Up went the sail, and the
Gannet
,
standing aback for a small shuddering moment, then lay over and dipped in salute to the sea, rose, gathered way, increased her way, and was off.

Finn knew that many were watching, for Wick was already stirring into the tumultuous life of the summer fishing. He beat out, and in due course prepared to put her about. Up into the eye of the wind, acknowledging the helm, pressing her weight against it to feel the assurance of Finn’s hand, up in a slowing but steady sweep, up and
round and falling over, and again gathering way,
increasing
her way, reaching out …

Finn’s heart sang in him, sang back to his boat in pride,

The crew made their compliments. Finn replied gravely, “She answers very well.”

But his heart was singing, and when they got outside he put up the mizzen, although there was a fair sea running and smashing on the skerries.

“We’ll see what she can do,” he decided. They saw his eyes gleam through the faint smile on his face that was lifted to the horizon. And he put her into it; he baptized her; he brought the strong spray over her bows; he lay her over until the sea seethed along her lee rail, but whatever he did, she answered him with increase, giving herself to the elements for which she had been created, assured of his hand.

Finn felt the sea-exhilaration come upon him. The wind was strengthening under the dark clouds. The crew sat very quiet, beyond comment. He should have been running
before
it for Clyth Head. But Finn and the
Gannet
had their own fight with the sea, before he said calmly, “I think she’ll do.”

She was very clean and sweet in her gleaming tar and new paint and grained wood of mast and oar, as she turned and flew before the wind.

“She is well named,” said the stranger of the crew, a middle-aged hired man from Stoer on the West Coast.

“You think so?” replied Finn, gratified.

“There’s nothing in Dunster will touch her for speed,” said Ian, on a lifted note of enthusiasm. “Nothing at all!”

“She has good lines,” nodded Finn.

“She’s as big as anything in Wick,” declared Donnie.

“I believe she is,” agreed Finn lightly. He was yet to own a boat of over forty feet, all decked, but such a boat for the herring fleet was still far in the future. “South-built”, with 30 feet keel, 34 feet 6
inches over all, and open from stem to stern, she seemed a large and splendid vessel to her
crew. Finn would not have thought twice of reaching for the Baltic!

But now he was reaching for home. The headlands, cliff walls, slopes, inland valleys, Morven—the fisherman’s mountain, the whole flow and shape of that stern land looked well to Finn. An attractive country, very
agreeable
, thought the new skipper with appropriate calm; but, inside, his heart was singing, because his heart had fallen in love with his boat and his croft and—and everything. For they were a grand folk, taking them all in all. They moved in procession, many and differing characters, on varied occasions, from the old smuggler Wull to the youngest lad hunting a rabbit in fear.

“See the Bodach now!” cried Ian, interrupting Finn’s thought. And there was the needle rock standing out from the headland.

But Finn lifted his face to Morven, ran his eyes along the saddle-backs of the Scarabens to steady them on the Birch Wood.

“I suppose that will be your landfall,” said the Stoer man to Finn, gazing at Morven.

“Yes,” said Finn, gazing at the Birch Wood

“You’ll be able to see it a long way at sea?”

“You see it,” said Finn, “when you see nothing else.” And he smiled.

“Look at them waiting for us on the shore!” exclaimed Donnie.

Finn’s body quickened and his eyes gleamed.

That opening season turned out a good one for the
Gannet.
It was altogether memorable for Finn. The old crew had got broken up, except for Rob who was still with Roddie. Callum had gone half-shares in a boat with his wife’s brother, and they engaged two men from the West Coast to complete the crew. Roddie had two men from Harris. There were not sufficient local men now to man all the boats during the summer season. The number of
“hired men” from the West Coast was steadily increasing, and Finn, because of his early wanderings ever had for them a special affection.

It was a pretty sight to see the boats reaching for the herring grounds, and folk would involuntarily stand and gaze: “The boats are going out.” At the ceilidh-house, a voice would say, “The boats are shot close in to-night,” or “The boats are shot off——” naming this cliff or that area. “Any word of the boats to-day?” “The boats were in early.” “The boats are coming in.” The boats. The boats.

George the foreman’s voice shouting, men quick-footed with the brimming creel, cascades of silver fish, bright eager faces of women and their swift hands, voices from Lewis drawn-out and soft and rhythmic; voices from Wick uplifted, direct, ironic; voices from Banffshire easy-going and full of diminutives. Bodies threading the maze of the busy hours of landing and gutting, the gleam of human life.

Una was there, and Meg, and Barbara, and Betz, and a shoal of young women besides, with older women, too, and greying-haired women tight-shawled and quick-tongued. And amid this plenty, the witch drew her share, for when it came to the hidden forces and the dark ones, as they affected the sea, the men of Banff had knowledge over all others, and the Lewis men had special knowledge, and ach, dash it! the sea loves the spendthrift hand anyway!

“Well, Finn, what luck to-day?” shouts Meg.

“Not bad,” cries Finn.

“What’ll you do with all your fortune?”

“You’d wonder.”

“Not for long,” answers Meg.

Una flashes him her dark smile. The excuses he makes to pass her way wouldn’t deceive a kitten, though he must think they do, for sometimes he passes without either look or speech. He just passes.

But, over all, it was not a markedly successful season and the
Gannet
was only one of the many fairly well-fished boats. Roddie was leading Finn by thirty crans. To every
fisherman, however, there comes, some time or other, his stroke of luck, and to Finn it came in the very last week of the fishing, and in so striking a fashion that he was never to forget it.

When, the nets shot, his crew had eaten their bite, pulled a fold of sail over them, and gone to sleep, Finn was
invaded
by a sleepless calm that left him inclined to sit and stare. Perhaps it was an aftermath of the sunset that had turned the clouds into vast banks of fiery red. The sky had indeed come alive in a wild and menacing beauty, and all the sea had run red in molten currents, and the red had come off the sea and shone in the faces of the silent crew and glittered in their eyes.

Now the last blood-flush was dying from a cloud in the east, slowly draining out of it, as Finn looked, until nothing but the leaden death-hue remained, and the cloud hung cold and still.

There had been a touch of menace in that red—though of what none of them could have said. Nor did they refer to it. For it raised up no definite thought or image; just as a chance glance at the eternal Book would raise up no definite image of desert sands, or sacrifice, or crucifixion.

The flat sky deepened its cold leaden hue and the water darkened under fitful movements of the dying wind. Gulls still cried in the cliffs not a great distance away, yet in cries distant and cavernous and forlorn. Once, by some trick of reflected light, Finn saw three of them float ghost-white against the black rock.

As he turned his eyes eastward, he saw over a hundred craft, masts lowered, riding to their nets. Those in the
distance
seemed very close together, but Finn knew there was little likelihood of their drifts getting entangled because along this coast—unlike the bays and inlets of the West—the tide moved in a slow steady stream. He was still haunted by the feeling that he had come too far west, for he was indeed the westernmost boat in the fleet. Yet there had been that curious secretive impulse to get into a clear space
of his own, the impulse that had often haunted the boy. Over and above, however, there had been another impulse springing out of a superstition that he would not have put words on for worlds. As they sailed out westward, he had kept her going, while boat after boat took up a fishing berth, until, with Tomas from Stoer restless and Donnie on the verge of comment, Finn opened out the western side of the Birch Wood and so, in his mind’s eye, Una’s cottage.

Night settled down on the sea and the near boats loomed indistinctly. A haze smothered the wood, and wiped away the image of the cottage, and slowly but surely carried away the hills. Finn did not feel that he was being unfair to Una. It would not occur to him to blame her as an unlucky talisman, should he draw blank nets and the other boats be well-fished. This was only his fancy; this was a secret
tribute
from far down in the deeps of his mind. As he thought of her, he saw her eyes darker than the night, but, unlike the night, they were dark wells of light. They glanced and lived, flashed away and came back, smiled and grew warm. He could see them now without seeing any other part of her.

He stirred restlessly. High time he was asleep. But now at sea, when her eyes came before him like this, they
exercised
an extreme entrancement.

Held in this thrall, time, too, for Finn was wiped away. He was brought back to his normal self, however, by a curious phenomenon, which his eyes had been staring at without consciously seeing. It was a large patch of glassy light on the dark sea. To his staring eyes it was like a
window
let into the blackness of the water. Not that in form it was square. On the contrary, it was irregular, but rounded, too, into a clearly defined shape. It was when this shape took the likeness of a woman’s head and shoulders that Finn was wakened by the finger of wonder. The woman’s head was bowed; beneath the face was an inlet of darkness; then the light came again on her breast. The likeness was in fact, quite clear, and Finn’s preoccupation merely gave it a vivid
and personal quality. But, astonishing as this phenomenon was to him, what next affected him was even more
astonishing
. They had, of course, shot their nets across the tide and nets and boat were slowly ebbing eastward. But this great figure—it must have been thirty yards across—was coming
against
the tide and towards his drift of nets. It was visibly moving over the windless sea. The head of the woman bowed right down as her breast touched his nets, and in a sinuous movement the whole rounded form
flattened
and ran along the drift As Finn watched, first one buoy, then another, gave a spasmodic upward jerk, like a living head struck under the chin, then fell back and slowly

As if struck himself, Finn fell upon the dead men and shook them to life, his voice harsh with triumph. “Boys, we’re in them!”

There was excitement then, but in restrained low voices, lest mystery or wonder overhear and be frightened away. Finn began to haul on the swing-rope, and at once in the water it turned into a rope of fire, a rope that threw off phosphorescent flame, streaming downward, as Finn put forth his strength; when the pressure came on the first net, the flame ran into sheets, swift evanescent fires, with the pale green light that is sometimes seen in the moon; but more intense, and always vanishing, elusive, instantly evoked and blown out by the uncanny magic of the
undersea
.

But the meshes of the net came up into the hands black and dripping and empty.

Then, fathoms away, there was a gleam from a solid silver bar, and amid the swirls of light that glowed and died it remained constant. It came with the net, came up out of the sea, in a little silver dance, and passed down into the hold.

It was not, however, until they began to haul the third net that they struck the first of the shoal. And now the silver bars formed in banks, banks of show that swayed in living mass, throwing off spindrift of elfin-green light. The
crew’s excitement increased as the weight called forth their strength. Slowly and carefully, now, steadily. Here they come! And they came in their companies, fluttering up out of the sea, the silver darlings, dancing in over the gunnel with small thin cries.