An Orkney Maid

“How old were you then, Ian?” asked Ragnor.

“I was twenty years old within a few days, and I had one pound, sixteen shillings in my pocket. Five pounds from an Episcopal church would be due in two weeks for my solo and part singing in their services; but they were never very prompt in their payment and that was nothing to rely on in my present need. I took to answering advertisements, and did some of the weariest tramping looking for work that poor humanity can do. When I met Kenneth McLeod, I had broken my last shilling. I was like a hungry, lost child, and the thought of my mother came to me and I felt as if my heart would break.

“The next moment I saw Kenneth McLeod coming up Prince’s Street. It was nearly four years since we had seen each other, but he knew me at once and called me in his old kind way. Then he looked keenly at me, and asked: ‘What is the matter, Ian? The old trouble?’

“I was so heartless and hungry I could hardly keep back tears as I answered: ‘It is that and everything else! Ken, help me, if you can.’ ‘Come with me!’ he answered, and I went with him into the Queen’s Hotel and he ordered dinner, and while we were eating I told him my situation. Then he said, ‘I can help you, Ian, if you will help me. You know that all my happiness is on the sea and father kept me on one or another of his trading boats as much as possible from my boyhood, so that I am now a clever enough navigator. Two years ago my father died and I am in a lot of trouble about managing the property he left me. Now, if you will take the oversight of my Edinburgh property, I can take my favourite boat and look after the coast trade of the Northern Islands.’

“What could I say? I was dumb with surprise and gratitude. I never thought there was anything wrong in our contract. I believed the work had come in answer to my prayer for help and I thanked God and Kenneth McLeod for it.”

Here Mrs. Ragnor rose, saying, “Coll, my dear one, Thora and I will now leave thee. I am sure Ian has done as well as he could do and we hope thou wilt judge him kindly.” Then the women went upstairs and Ragnor remained silent until Ian said:

“I am very anxious, sir.”

Then Ragnor stood up and slowly answered, “Ian, now is the time to take council of my pillow. What I have to say I will say later. This is not a thing to be settled by a yes or no. I must think over what thou hast told me. I must have some words with my wife and daughter. Sleep one night at least over thy trouble, there are many things to consider; especially this question of the young lady who is made the last count of Jean Hay’s letter. What hast thou to say about her? She seems to have had some strong claim upon thy–shall we say friendship?”

“You might say much more than friendship, sir, and yet wrong neither man nor woman by it. Why, the young lady was Agnes Henderson, the sister of Willie Henderson, who is my soul’s brother and my second self. Thora must have heard all about Agnes!”

“Is she Deacon Scot Henderson’s daughter?”

“Of course she is! Who else would I have left two engagements to serve? But Agnes is dear to me, perhaps dearer than my own sister. Since she was nine years old, we have studied and played together. Willie and Agnes were the only loves and only friends of my desolate boyhood. You have doubtless heard how unhappy the deacon’s second marriage has been. Both Willie and Agnes refused the stepmother he gave them, and last year Willie went to New York, where he is doing very well. But Agnes has been more and more wretched, and a recent proposal of marriage between herself and the stepmother’s nephew has made her life intolerable. Two weeks ago I had a letter from Willie, telling me he had just written her, advising an immediate ‘give-up’ of the whole situation. He told her to take the first good steamer and come to him. He also urged her to send for me and take my help and advice about the voyage. Two weeks ago last Friday she did so and I went at once to the West End Hotel to see her. She had disguised herself so cleverly that it was difficult to recognise her. I went with her to her sitting room and there I found the woman who had waited on her all her life long. I knew her well for she had often scolded me for leading Agnes into danger.

“I ate lunch with Agnes and during it I told her to transfer all her money not required for travelling expenses to the Bank of New York; and I promised to go at once and secure a passage for herself and maid–for seeing that the Atlantic would leave her dock for New York about the noon hour of the next day, haste was necessary. I did not wish to go to Liverpool because of my two engagements, but Agnes was so insistent on my presence I could not refuse her. Well, perhaps I was wrong to yield to her entreaties.”

“No, hardly,” said Ragnor. “Going on board a big steamer at Liverpool must be a muddling business–not fit for two simple women like Agnes Henderson and her maid.”

“I don’t remember thinking of that but I could hear my friend Willie telling me, ‘See her safe on board, Ian. Don’t leave her till she is in the captain’s care. Do this for me, Ian!’ And I did it for both Agnes’ and Willie’s sake but mainly for Willie’s, for I love him. He is my right-hand friend, always. Perhaps I did wrong.”

“It is a pity there was any mystification about it. Was it necessary for Agnes Henderson to disguise herself?”

“Perhaps not, but it prevented trouble and disappointment. Her father supposed her to be at her uncle’s home. On Saturday afternoon he went to see her and found she had not been there at all. He returned to Edinburgh and could get no trace of her, nor was she located until I returned and informed him that she was on the Atlantic.”

There was a few moments of silence and then Ian said, “Have I done anything unpardonable? Surely you will not let that jealous, envious letter stand between Thora and myself?”

Then Ragnor answered, “Tonight I will say neither this nor that on the matter. I will sleep over the subject and take counsel of One wiser than myself. Thou had better do likewise. Many things are to consider.”

And Ian went away without a word. There was anger in his heart, and as he sat gloomily in his dimly lit room and felt the damp chill of the midnight, he told himself that he had been hardly judged. “I have done nothing wrong,” he whispered passionately. “Old McLeod collected his own rents and looked after his own property and no one thought he did wrong. He was an elder in one of the largest Edinburgh kirks and the favourite chairman in missionary meetings, but because I did not go to kirk, what was business in him was sin in me.

“As to the gambling houses, I had nothing to do with them but to collect lawful money, due the McLeod estate; and as far as I can see, men who gamble for money are quite respectable if they get what they gamble for. There was that old reprobate Lord Sinclair. He redeemed the Sinclair estates by gambling and he married the beautiful daughter of the noble Seaforths. Nobody blamed him. Pshaw! It is all a matter of money–or it is my ill luck.” And to such irritating reflections he finally fell asleep.

CHAPTER IX

THE BREAD OF BITTERNESS

Sorrow develops the mind. It seems as if a soul was given us to suffer with–

Dust to dust, but the pure spirit shall flowBack to the burning fountain whence it cameA portion of the Eternal which must glowThrough time and change unalterably the same.Our endless need is met by God’s endless help.

At her room door Thora bid her mother good night. Rahal desired to talk with her, but the girl shook her head and said wearily, “I want to think, Mother. I have no heart to speak yet.” And Rahal turned sadly away. She knew that hour, that her child had come to a door for which she had no key and she left her alone with the situation she had to face. Nor did Thora just then realize that within the past hour her girlhood had vanished, and that she had suddenly become a woman with a woman’s fate upon her and a woman’s heart-rending problem to solve.

How it came she did not enquire, yet she did recognise some change in herself. Hitherto, all her troubles had been borne by her father or mother. This trouble was her very own. No one could carry it for her but without any hesitation she accepted it. “I must find out the very root of this matter,” she said to herself, “and I will not go to bed until I do. Nor is it half-asleep I will be over the question. I will sit up and be wide awake.”

So she put more peat and coal on her fire and lit a fresh candle; removed her day clothing and wrapped herself in a large down cloak. And the night was not cold for there was a southerly wind, and the gulf stream embraces the Orkneys, giving them an abnormally warm climate for their far-north latitude. And she had a passing wonder at herself for these precautions. A year ago, a week ago, she would have thrown herself upon her bed in passionate weeping or clung to her mother and talked her sorrow away in her loving sympathy and advice.

But at this supreme hour of her life, she wanted to be alone. She did not wish to talk about Ian with any one. She was wide awake, quite sensible of the pain and grief at her heart, yet tearless and calm. Never before had she felt that dignity of soul, which looks straight into the face of its sorrow and feels itself equal to the bearing of it. She had as yet no idea that during that evening she had passed through that wonderful heart-experience, which suddenly ripens girlhood into womanhood. Indeed, they will be thoughtless girls–whatever their age–who can read this sentence and not pause and recall that marvellous transition in their own lives. To some it comes with a great joy, to others with a great sorrow but it is always a fateful event, and girls should be ready to meet and salute it.

As soon as Thora had made herself and her room comfortable, she sat down and closed her eyes. All her life she had noticed that her mother shut her eyes when she wanted to think. Now she did the same, and then softly called Ian Macrae to the judgment of her heart and her inner senses, but she did it as naturally as women equally ignorant have done it in all ages, taking or refusing their advice or verdict as directed by their dominant desire, or their reason or unreason.

With almost supernatural clearness she recalled his beautiful, yet troubled face, his hesitating manner, his restlessness in his chair, his nervous trifling with his watch chain or his finger ring. She recalled the fact that his voice had in it a strange tone and that his eyes reflected a soul fearful and angry. It was an unfamiliar Ian she called up, but oh! if it could ever become a familiar one.

The first subject that pressed her for consideration was the suspicion of gambling. Certainly Ian had promptly denied the charge. He had even said that he never was in the gambling parlours but once, when he went into them very early with the porter, to assure himself that some new carpets asked for were really wanted. “Then,” he added, “I found out that the demand was made by one of the club members, who had a friend who was a carpet manufacturer and expected to supply what was considered necessary.”

It must be recalled here that Norsemen, though sharp and keen in business matters, have no gambling fever in their blood. To get money and give nothing for it! That goes too far beyond their idea of fair business, and as for pleasure, they have never connected it with the paper kings and queens. They find in the sea and their ships, in adventure, in music and song, in dancing and story telling, all of pleasure they require. A common name for a pack of cards is “the devil’s books,” and in Orkney they have but few readers.

Thora had partially exonerated Ian from the charge of gambling when she remembered Jean Hay’s assertion that “wherever horses were racing, there Ian was sure to be and that he had been named in the newspapers as a winner on the horse Sergius.” Ian had passed by this circumstance, and her father had either intentionally or unintentionally done the same. Once she had heard Vedder say that “horse racing produced finer and faster horses”; and she remembered well, that her father asked in reply, “If it was well to produce finer and faster horses, at the cost of making horsier men?” And he had further said that he did not know of any uglier type of man than a “betting book in breeches.” She thought a little on this subject and then decided Ian ought to be talked to about it.

Her lover’s neglect of the Sabbath was the next question, for Thora was a true and loving daughter of the Church of England. Episcopacy was the kernel of her faith. She believed all bishops were just like Bishop Hedley and that the most perfect happiness was found in the Episcopal Communion. And she said positively to her heart–“It is through the church door we will reach the Home door, and I am sure Ian will go with me to keep the Sabbath in the cathedral. Every one goes to church in Kirkwall. He could not resist such a powerful public example, and then he would begin to like to go of his own inclination. I could trust him on this point, I feel sure.”

When she took up the next doubt her brow clouded and a shadow of annoyance blended itself with her anxious, questioning expression. “His name!” she muttered. “His name! Why did he woo me under a false name? Mother says my marriage to him under the name of Ian Macrae would not be lawful. Of course he intended to marry me with his proper name. He would have been sure to tell us all before the marriage day–but I saw father was angry and troubled at the circumstance. He ought to have told us long ago. Why didn’t he do so? I should have loved him under any name. I should have loved him better under John than Ian. John is a strong, straight name. Great and good men in all ages have made John honourable. It has no diminutive. It can’t be made less than John. Englishmen and lowland Scotch all say the four sensible letters with a firm, strong voice; only the Celt turns John into Ian. I will not call him Ian again. Not once will I do it.”

Then she covered her eyes with her hand and a sharp, chagrined catch of her breath broke the hush of the still room. And her voice, though little stronger than a whisper, was full of painful wonder. “What will people say? What shall we say? Oh, the shame! Oh, the mortification! Who will now live in my pretty home? Who will eat my wedding cake? What will become of my wedding dress? Oh, Thora! Thora! Love has led thee a shameful, cruel road! What wilt thou do? What can thou do?”

Then a singular thing happened. A powerful thought from some forgotten life came with irresistible strength into her mind, and though she did not speak the words suggested, she prayed them–if prayer be that hidden, never-dying imploration that goes with the soul from one incarnation to another–for the words that sprang to her memory must have been learned centuries before, “Oh, Mary! Mary! Mother of Jesus Christ! Thou that drank the cup of all a woman’s griefs and wrongs, pray for me!”

And she was still and silent as the words passed through her consciousness. She thought every one of them, they seemed at the moment so real and satisfying. Then she began to wonder and ask herself, “Where did those words come from? When did I hear them? Where did I say them before? How do they come to be in my memory? From what strange depth of Life did they come? Did I ever have a Roman Catholic nurse? Did she whisper them to my soul, when I was sick and suffering? I must ask mother–oh, how tired and sleepy I feel–I will go to bed–I have done no good, come to no decision. I will sleep–I will tell mother in the morning–I wish I had let her stop with me–mother always knows–what is the best way–” And thus the heart-breaking session ended in that blessed hostel, The Inn of Dreamless Sleep.

There was, however, little sleep in the House of Ragnor that night, and very early in the morning Ragnor, fully dressed, spoke to his wife. “Art thou waking yet, Rahal?” he asked, and Rahal answered, “I have slept little. I have been long awake.”

“Well then, what dost thou think now of Ian Macrae, so-called?”

“I think little amiss of him–some youthful follies–nothing to make a fuss about.”

“Hast thou considered that the follies of youth may become the follies of manhood, and of age? What then?”

“We are not told to worry about what may be.”

“Ian has evidently been living and spending with people far above his means and his class.”

“The Lowland Scotch regard a minister as socially equal to any peer. Are not the servants of God equal, and more than equal, to the servants of the queen? No society is above either they or their children. That I have seen always. And young men of fine appearance and charming manners, like Ian, are welcome in every home, high or low. Yes, indeed!”

“Yet girls, as a rule, should not marry handsome men with charming manners, unless there is something better behind to rely on.”

“If thou had not been a handsome man with a charming manner, Rahal would not have married thee. What then?”

“I would have been a ruined man. I cared for nothing but thee.”

“I believe that a girl of moral strength and good intelligence should be trusted with the choice of her destiny. It is not always that parents have a right to thrust a destiny they choose upon their daughter. If a man is not as good and as rich as they think she ought to marry they can point this out, and if they convince their child, very well; and if they do not convince her, also very well. Perhaps the girl’s character requires just the treatment it will evolve from a life of struggle.”

“Thou art talking nonsense, Rahal. Thy liking for the young man has got the better of thy good sense. I cannot trust thee in this matter.”

“Well then, Coll, the road to better counsel than mine, is well known to thee.”

“I think Bishop Hedley arrived about an hour ago. There were moving lights on the pier, and as soon as the morning breaks I am going to see him.”

“Have thy own way. When a man’s wife has not the wisdom wanted, it is well that he go to his Bishop, for Bishops are full of good counsel, even for the ruling of seven churches, so I have heard.”

“It is not hearsay between thee and Bishop Hedley. Thou art well acquainted with him.”

“Well then, in the end thou wilt take thy own way.”

“Dost thou want me to say ‘yes’ today, and rue it tomorrow? I have no mind for any such foolishness.”

“Coll, this is a time when deeds will be better than words.”

“I see that. Well then, the day breaks, and I will go”–he lingered a minute or two fumbling about his knitted gloves but Rahal was dressing her hair and took no further notice. So he went away in an affected hurry and both dissatisfied and uncertain. “What a woman she is!” he sighed. “She has said only good words, but I feel as if I had broken every commandment at once.”

He went away full of trouble and anxiety, and Rahal watched him down the garden path and along the first stretch of the road. She knew by his hurried steps and the nervous play of his walking stick that he was both angry and troubled and she was not very sorry.

“If it was his business standing and his good name, instead of Thora’s happiness and good repute that was the question, oh, how careful and conciliatory he would be! How anxious to keep his affairs from public discussion! It would be anything rather than that! I have the same feeling about Thora’s good name. The marriage ought to go on for Thora’s sake. I do not want the women of Kirkwall wondering who was to blame. I do not want them coming to see me with solemn looks and tearful voices. I could not endure their pitying of ‘poor Miss Thora!’ They would not dare go to Coll with their sympathetic curiosity, but there are such women as Astar Gager, and Lala Snackoll, and Thyra Peterson, and Jorunna Flett. No one can keep them away from a house in trouble. Thora must marry. I see no endurable way to prevent it.”

Then being dressed she went to Thora’s room, and gently opened the door. Thora was standing at her mirror and she turned to her mother with a smiling face. Rahal was astonished and she said almost with a tone of disapproval, “I am glad to see thee able to smile. I expected to find thee weeping, and ill with weeping.”

“For a long time, for many hours, I was broken-hearted but there came to me, Mother, a strange consolation.” Then she told her mother about the prayer she heard her soul say for her. “Not one word did I speak, Mother. But someone prayed for me. I heard them. And I was made strong and satisfied, and fell into a sweet sleep, though I had yet not solved the problem I had proposed to solve before I slept.”

“What was that problem?”

“First, whether I should marry John just as he was, and trust the consequences to my influence over him; or whether I should refuse him altogether and forever; or whether I should wait and see what he can do with my father and the good Bishop, to help and strengthen him.” And as Thora talked, Rahal’s face grew light and sweet as she listened, and she answered–“Yes, my dear one, that is the wonderful way! Some soul that loved thee long, long ago, knew that thou wert in great trouble. Some woman’s soul, perhaps, that had lived and died for love. The kinship of our souls far exceeds that of our bodies, and their help is swift and sure. Be patient with Ian. That is what I say.”

“But why that prayer? I never heard it before.”

“How little thou knowest of what thou hast heard before! Two hundred years ago, all sorrowful, unhappy women went to Mary with their troubles.”

“They should not have done so. They could have gone to Christ.”

“They thought Mary had suffered just what they were suffering, and they thought that Christ had never known any of the griefs that break a woman’s heart. Mary knew them, had felt them, had wept and prayed over them. When my little lad Eric died, I thought of Mary. My family have only been one hundred years Protestants. All of them must have loved thee well enough to come and pray for thee. Thou had a great honour, as well as a great comfort.”

“At any rate I did no wrong! I am glad, Mother.”

“Wrong! Thou wilt see the Bishop today. Ask him. He will tell thee that the English Church and the English women gave up very reluctantly their homage to Mary. Are not their grand churches called after Peter and Paul and other male saints? Dost thou think that Christ loved Peter and Paul more than his mother? I know better. Please God thou wilt know better some day.”

“Churches are often called after Mary, as well as the saints.”

“Not in Scotland.”

“There is one in Glasgow. Vedder told me he used to hear Bishop Hedley preach there.”

“It is an Episcopal Church. Ask him about thy dream. No, I mean thy soul’s experience.”

“Thou said dream, Mother. It was not a dream. I saw no one. I only heard a voice. It is what we see in dreams that is important.”

“Now wilt thou come to thy breakfast?”

“Is he downstairs yet?”

“I will go and call him.”

Rahal, however, came to the table alone. She said, “Ian asked that he might lie still and sleep an hour or two. He has not slept all night long, I think,” she added. “His voice sounded full of trouble.”

So the two women ate their breakfast alone for Ragnor did not return in time to join them. And Rahal’s hopefulness left her, and she was silent and her face had a grey, fearful expression that Thora could not help noticing. “You look ill, Mother!” she said, “and you were looking so well when we came downstairs. What is it?”

“I know not. I feel as if I was going into a black cloud. I wish that thy father would come home. He is in trouble. I wonder then what is the matter!”

In about an hour they saw Ragnor and the Bishop coming towards the house together.

“They are in trouble, Thora, both of them are in trouble.”

“About Thora they need not to be in trouble. She will do what they advise her to do.”

“It is not thee.”

“What then?”

“I will not name my fear, lest I call it to me.”

Then she rose and went to the door and Thora followed her, and by this time, Ragnor and the Bishop were at the garden gate. Very soon the Bishop was holding their hands, and Rahal found when he released her hand that he had left a letter in it. Yet for a moment she hardly noticed the fact, so shocked was she at the expression of her husband’s face. He looked so much older, his eyes were two wells of sorrow, his distress had passed beyond words, and when she asked, “What is thy trouble, Coll?” he looked at her pitifully and pointed to the letter. Then she took Thora’s hand and they went to her room together.