Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood Part 27

But the fairest, wi' hair like the mune in a clud, She sought till she was the last.

He creepin' went and watchin' stud, And he thought to hold her fast.

She dropped at his feet without motion or heed; He took her, and home he sped.-- All day she lay like a withered seaweed, On a purple and gowden bed.

But at night whan the wind frae the watery bars Blew into the dusky room, She opened her een like twa settin' stars, And back came her twilight bloom.

The king's son knelt beside her bed: She was his ere a month had pa.s.sed; And the cold sea-maiden he had wed Grew a tender wife at last.

And all went well till her baby was born, And then she couldna sleep; She would rise and wander till breakin' morn, Hark-harkin' the sound o' the deep.

One night when the wind was wailing about, And the sea was speckled wi' foam, From room to room she went in and out And she came on her carven comb.

She twisted her hair with eager hands, She put in the comb with glee: She's out and she's over the glittering sands, And away to the moaning sea.

One cry came back from far away: He woke, and was all alone.

Her night robe lay on the marble grey, And the cold sea-maiden was gone.

Ever and aye frae first peep o' the moon, Whan the wind blew aff o' the sea, The desert sh.o.r.e still up and doon Heavy at heart paced he.

But never more came the maidens to play From the merry cold-hearted sea; He heard their laughter far out and away, But heavy at heart paced he.

I have modernized the ballad--indeed spoiled it altogether, for I have made up this version from the memory of it--with only, I fear, just a touch here and there of the original expression.

"That's what comes of taking what you have no right to," said Turkey, in whom the practical had ever the upper hand of the imaginative.

As we walked home together I resumed the subject.

"I think you're too hard on the king's son," I said. "He couldn't help falling in love with the mermaid."

"He had no business to steal her comb, and then run away with herself," said Turkey.

"She was none the worse for it," said I.

"Who told you that?" he retorted. "I don't think the girl herself would have said so. It's not every girl that would care to marry a king's son. She might have had a lover of her own down in the sea. At all events the prince was none the better for it."

"But the song says she made a tender wife," I objected.

"She couldn't help herself. She made the best of it. I dare say he wasn't a bad sort of a fellow, but he was no gentleman."

"Turkey!" I exclaimed. "He was a prince!"

"I know that."

"Then he must have been a gentleman."

"I don't know that. I've read of a good many princes who did things I should be ashamed to do."

"But you're not a prince, Turkey," I returned, in the low endeavour to bolster up the wrong with my silly logic.

"No. Therefore if I were to do what was rude and dishonest, people would say: 'What could you expect of a ploughboy?' A prince ought to be just so much better bred than a ploughboy. I would scorn to do what that prince did. What's wrong in a ploughboy can't be right in a prince, Ra.n.a.ld. Or else right is only right sometimes; so that right may be wrong and wrong may be right, which is as much as to say there is no right and wrong; and if there's no right and wrong, the world's an awful mess, and there can't be any G.o.d, for a G.o.d would never have made it like that."

"Well, Turkey, you know best. I can't help thinking the prince was not so much to blame, though."

"You see what came of it--misery."

"Perhaps he would rather have had the misery and all together than none of it."

"That's for him to settle. But he must have seen he was wrong, before he had done wandering by the sea like that."

"Well now, Turkey, what would you have done yourself, suppose the beautifulest of them all had laid her comb down within an inch of where you were standing--and never saw you, you know?"

Turkey thought for a moment before answering.

"I'm supposing you fell in love with her at first sight, you know," I added.

"Well, I'm sure I should not have kept the comb, even if I had taken it just to get a chance of speaking to her. And I can't help fancying if he had behaved like a gentleman, and let her go without touching her the first time, she might have come again; and if he had married her at last of her own free will, she would not have run away from him, let the sea have kept calling her ever so much."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

The next evening, I looked for Elsie as usual, but did not see her.

How blank and dull the schoolroom seemed! Still she might arrive any moment. But she did not come. I went through my duties wearily, hoping ever for the hour of release. I could see well enough that Turkey was anxious too. The moment school was over, we hurried away, almost without a word, to the cottage. There we found her weeping. Her grandmother had died suddenly. She clung to Turkey, and seemed almost to forget my presence. But I thought nothing of that. Had the case been mine, I too should have clung to Turkey from faith in his help and superior wisdom.

There were two or three old women in the place. Turkey went and spoke to them, and then took Elsie home to his mother. Jamie was asleep, and they would not wake him.

How it was arranged, I forget, but both Elsie and Jamie lived for the rest of the winter with Turkey's mother. The cottage was let, and the cow taken home by their father. Before summer Jamie had got a place in a shop in the village, and then Elsie went back to her mother.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

An Evening Visit

I now saw much less of Elsie; but I went with Turkey, as often as I could, to visit her at her father's cottage. The evenings we spent there are amongst the happiest hours in my memory. One evening in particular appears to stand out as a type of the whole. I remember every point in the visit. I think it must have been almost the last.

We set out as the sun was going down on an evening in the end of April, when the nightly frosts had not yet vanished. The hail was dancing about us as we started; the sun was disappearing in a bank of tawny orange cloud; the night would be cold and dark and stormy; but we cared nothing for that: a conflict with the elements always added to the pleasure of any undertaking then. It was in the midst of another shower of hail, driven on the blasts of a keen wind, that we arrived at the little cottage. It had been built by Duff himself to receive his bride, and although since enlarged, was still a very little house. It had a foundation of stone, but the walls were of turf. He had lined it with boards, however, and so made it warmer and more comfortable than most of the labourers' dwellings. When we entered, a glowing fire of peat was on the hearth, and the pot with the supper hung over it. Mrs. Duff was spinning, and Elsie, by the light of a little oil lamp suspended against the wall, was teaching her youngest brother to read. Whatever she did, she always seemed in my eyes to do it better than anyone else; and to see her under the lamp, with one arm round the little fellow who stood leaning against her, while the other hand pointed with a knitting-needle to the letters of the spelling-book which lay on her knee, was to see a lovely picture. The mother did not rise from her spinning, but spoke a kindly welcome, while Elsie got up, and without approaching us, or saying more than a word or two, set chairs for us by the fire, and took the little fellow away to put him to bed.

"It's a cold night," said Mrs. Duff. "The wind seems to blow through me as I sit at my wheel. I wish my husband would come home."

"He'll be suppering his horses," said Turkey. "I'll just run across and give him a hand, and that'll bring him in the sooner."

"Thank you, Turkey," said Mrs. Duff as he vanished.

"He's a fine lad," she remarked, much in the same phrase my father used when speaking of him.

"There's n.o.body like Turkey," I said.

"Indeed, I think you're right there, Ra.n.a.ld. A better-behaved lad doesn't step. He'll do something to distinguish himself some day. I shouldn't wonder if he went to college, and wagged his head in a pulpit yet."