The Silver Bough (29 page)

He nodded, and when she had gone out, he went up to his bedroom and changed into his old knickerbocker suit.

It seemed to him that the bedroom was extraordinarily quiet, full of peace. Emotion was a heady food! I'll go out for a walk, he thought, and lie on the earth in a quiet place. You'll go to the little shore, he said; he was sitting on his bed, fully clothed, and with a smile looked at the mat, for it was as though the “influence” had spoken in him. Amused, he went and opened the door of the dark room, saw the black cloth hanging from the skylight, and on the floor the narrow box caught in a musty sun-warmth that came against his face. He closed the door. The “influence” was so obviously nothing more than his own unconscious promptings! But he might as well go out.

A
ware of some obscure internal argument about the direction his feet were taking, he really paid little attention to it. Old Fachie was sitting at his gable corner, a cloud of smoke rising like incense from his head. Comfortably fed after a very enjoyable funeral, he would be indulging in reminiscence and reflection, wondering with solemn appreciation how and why he had been spared so long. “Many's the change I have seen in Clachar in my time,” he would begin, but Grant's footsteps did not deviate, though he acknowledged the ancient's salute with the full length of his own right arm.

He had enjoyed the funeral himself. There had been a wonderful sense of balance about it somewhere. An integrating influence. Social or communal primarily, no doubt, but personal in actual effect. To abide sentiment solidly on your two feet made you feel wonderfully competent, and wise. The people who sneered, who ran away to protect their skinned sensibilities, missed something, something much larger than their own egos. That was perfectly clear and extended the scope of the world, allowing things to happen under time and chance with a certain naturalness.

Though how rarely they happened as each individual wished them to! And clearly they couldn't, or the over-all balance would be lost. For the whole had this balance, which was extra to the sum of its parts. Having arrived at this conclusion from living experience, he paused to look back and take a breath. The cottages, the little fields, the winding stream, the road—and on the road two figures, a man and a woman. The woman was Mrs Cameron beyond doubt. She would be getting all the news of the funeral in detail. God bless her! he thought, and laughed softly. His eyes roved over the slopes and the ridges and came to the cairn. Curious humans were moving around it like ants round their anthill, but two of the labour squad would be on guard by direct order of the Colonel, who did not believe, he had said, in skulls as souvenirs. For a little while his eyes rested on Clachar House, then he continued up the slope.

No, things did not happen to romantic order. In that sense, nothing had “come right”. Andie had been killed and the crock of gold had been buried under the rainbow. Not actually under the rainbow, but near enough to give immortal sense to Keats and the figures on his Grecian Urn:

Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal—yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss . . . .

The crock of gold seemed to have brought Keats to life in him after many years! And it would not help much now to be jealous of the rainbow! After all, a crock of gold under the rainbow would be only an urn in a museum. Even irony had its over-all balance. The poets needed a myth to feed on. It was their secreted honey. Keats took over from the archaeologist.

And his brave hope that he might be able to show some connection between the crock of gold and the lady in the box in his bedroom! . . . She had been asleep today, quietly. Or had she turned over in her sleep and smiled—and set his feet walking?

How fantastic a being was man in his secret recesses! There was nothing mad enough for him secretly to conceive—even Anna as a housekeeper and Sheena getting piano lessons! A faint squirm touched him now. He had been suppressing in himself the cry that Anna had given over the body of Martin on the storm-driven foreshore. He nodded, and went on.

Nothing had certainty in it to anyone . . . except to Sheena playing her Silver Bough. Quite literally, that was the fact. He saw it with such absolute clarity that he laughed again. And presumably here was the “influence” that had been directing his footsteps!

Heady stuff, this sentiment! He had not got quite used to it yet. The funeral had helped; and afterwards, with Mrs Cameron . . . she had really deep down been quite cross with Anna for not knowing how to handle a man! He laughed for the third time, and then his thoughts fell from him, for he was coming over the ridge and he should see in a moment if the two of them were on the little shore.

It took full five seconds for his wits to gather enough sense to make him lie down. Martin was leaning against the stem of his boat which he had grounded on the shingle by the dark skerry. Fleeing the funeral concourse to the fishing grounds, he had presumably been attracted once more by the same figure on the strand. Grant saw the Silver Bough glisten in the sun. She was showing it to him. It flashed as she tipped it up. Anna was standing at a little distance, quite still.

No sound reached him as Sheena played her melody. Everything was arrested except the just perceptible movement of her hand. The playing seemed to go on beyond time. But at last it stopped, and now everything was absolutely arrested. Slowly Sheena's head tilted up. Martin straightened himself. He looked at Anna and called something. She went down towards them slowly. He turned and heaved the boat afloat, holding the gunnel firmly while Anna stepped in from the rock. Then he lifted Sheena in and finally the Silver Bough. Pushing off, he got both ours going and headed outward over the tranquil sea; then gradually her bow came round, and to the watcher above it was clear at last beyond mortal doubt that a strange and adventurous journey had begun to the White Shore.