The Works of Fiona Macleod Part 4

The stone-breaker looked sullenly at the speaker.

"If you're not anxious to live," he said, "will you give me what money you have? It is a pity good money should be wasted. I know well where I would be spending it this night of the nights," he added abruptly in Gaelic.

The Body looked at him with curious eyes.

"And where would you be spending it?" he asked, in the same language.

"This is the night of the marriage of John Macdonald, the rich man from America, who has come back to his own town, and is giving a big night of it to all his friends, and his friends' friends."

"Is that the John Macdonald who is marrying Elsie Cameron?" demanded the Body eagerly.

"Ay, the same; though it may be the other daughter of Alastair Rua, the girl Morag."

A flush rose to the face of the Body. His eyes sparkled.

"It is Elsie," he said to the man.

"Belike," the stone-breaker muttered indifferently.

"Do you know where Alastair Rua and his daughters are?"

"Yes, at Beann Marsanta Macdonald's big house of the One-Ash Farm."

"Can you show me the way?"

"I'm going that way."

Thereat the Body turned to his comrades:

"I love her," he said simply; "I love Morag Cameron."

"She is not for your loving," answered the Will sharply; "for she has given troth to old Archibald Sinclair."

The Body laughed.

"Love is love," he said lightly.

"Come," interrupted the Soul wearily; "we have loitered long enough. Let us go."

We stood looking at the stone-breaker, who was gazing curiously at us.

Suddenly he laughed.

"Why do you laugh?" asked the Soul.

"Well, I'm not for knowing that. But I'll tell you this: if you two wish to go into the town, you have only to follow this road. And if _you_ want to come to One-Ash Farm, then you must come this other way with me."

"Do not go," whispered the Soul.

But the Body, with an impatient gesture, drew aside. "Leave me," he added: "I wish to go with this man. I will meet you to-morrow morning at the first bridge to the westward of the little town yonder, just where the stream slackens over the pebbles."

With reluctant eyes the two companions saw their comrade leave. For a long time the Will watched him with a bitter smile. Redeeming love was in the longing eyes of the Soul.

When the Body and the stone-breaker were alone, as they walked towards the distant farm-steading, where already were lights, and whence came a lowing of kye in the byres, for it was the milking hour, they spoke at intervals.

"Who were those with you?" asked the man.

"Friends. We have come away together."

"What for?"

"Well, as you would say, to see the world."

"To see the world?" The man laughed. "To see the world! Have you money?"

"Enough for our needs."

"Then you will see nothing. The world gives to them that already have, an' more than have."

"What do you hope for to-night?"

"To be drunk."

"That is a poor thing to hope for. Better to think of the laugh and the joke by the fireside; and of food and drink, too, if you will: of the pipes, and dancing, and pretty girls."

"Do as you like. As for me, I hope to be drunk."

"Why?"

"Why? Because I'll be another man then. I'll have forgotten all that I now remember from sunrise to sundown. Can you think what it is to break a hope in your heart each time you crack a stone on the roadside?

That's what I am, a stone-breaker, an' I crack stones inside as well as outside. It's a stony place my heart, G.o.d knows."

"You are young to speak like that, and you speak like a man who has known better days."

"Oh, I'm ancient enough," said the man, with a short laugh.

"What meaning does that have?"

"What meaning? Well, it just means this, that I'm as old as the Bible.

For there's mention o' me there. Only there I'm herding swine, an' here I'm breaking stones."

"And is _your_ father living?"

"Ay, he curses me o' Sabbaths."

"Then it's not the same as the old story that is in the Bible?"

"Oh, nothing's the same an' everything's the same--except when you're drunk, an' then it's only the same turned outside in. But see, yonder's the farm. Take my advice, an' drink. It's better than the fireside, it's better than food, it's better than kisses, ay it's better than love, it's as good as hate, an' it's the only thing you can drown in except despair."

Soon after this the Body entered the house of the Beann Marsanta Macdonald, and with laughter and delight met Morag Cameron, and others whom his heart leaped to see.