PAGE 15
The Heir Of The McHulishes
by
Nevertheless, she was one of the first to leap ashore when the yawl’s bow grated in a pebbly cove, and carried her pretty but incongruous little slippers through the seaweed, wet sand, and slimy cobbles with a heroism that redeemed her vanity. A scrambling ascent of a few moments brought them to a wall with a gap in it, which gave easy ingress to the interior of the ruins. This was merely a little curving hollow from which the outlines of the plan had long since faded. It was kept green by the brown walls, which, like the crags of the mainland valleys, sheltered it from the incessant strife of the Atlantic gales. A few pale flowers that might have grown in a damp cellar shivered against the stones. Scraps of newspapers, soda-water and beer bottles, highly decorated old provision tins, and spent cartridge cases,–the remains of chilly picnics and damp shooting luncheons,–had at first sight lent color to the foreground by mere contrast, but the corrosion of time and weather had blackened rather than mellowed the walls in a way which forcibly reminded the consul of Miss Elsie’s simile of the “burnt-down factory.” The view from the square tower–a mere roost for unclean sea-fowl, from the sides of which rags of peeling moss and vine hung like tattered clothing–was equally depressing. The few fishermen’s huts along the shore were built of stones taken from the ruin, and roofed in with sodden beams and timbers in the last stages of deliquescence. The thick smoke of smouldering peat-fires came from the low chimneys, and drifted across the ruins with the odors of drying fish.
“I’ve just seen a sort of ground-plan of the castle,” said Miss Elsie cheerfully. “It never had a room in it as big as our bedroom in the hotel, and there weren’t windows enough to go round. A slit in the wall, about two inches wide by two feet long, was considered dazzling extravagance to Malcolm’s ancestors. I don’t wonder some of ’em broke out and swam over to America. That reminds me. Who do you suppose is here–came over from the hotel in a boat of his own, just to see maw!”
“Not Malcolm, surely.”
“Not much,” replied Miss Elsie, setting her small lips together. “It’s Mr. Custer. He’s talking business with her now down on the beach. They’ll be here when lunch is ready.”
The consul remembered the romantic plan which the enthusiastic Custer had imparted to him in the foggy consulate at St. Kentigern, and then thought of the matter of fact tourists, the few stolid fishermen, and the prosaic ruins around them, and smiled. He looked up, and saw that Miss Elsie was watching him.
“You know Mr. Custer, don’t you?”
“We are old Californian friends.”
“I thought so; but I think he looked a little upset when he heard you were here, too.”
He certainly was a little awkward, as if struggling with some half-humorous embarrassment, as he came forward a few moments later with Mrs. Kirkby. But the stimulation of the keen sea air triumphed over the infelicities of the situation and surroundings, and the little party were presently enjoying their well-selected luncheon with the wholesome appetite of travel and change. The chill damp made limp the napkins and table-cloth, and invaded the victuals; the wind, which was rising, whistled round the walls, and made miniature cyclones of the torn paper and dried twigs around them: but they ate, drank, and were merry. At the end of the repast the two gentlemen rose to light their cigars in the lee of the wall.
“I suppose you know all about Malcolm?” said Custer, after an awkward pause.
“My dear fellow,” said the consul, somewhat impatiently, “I know nothing about him, and you ought to know that by this time.”
“I thought YOUR FRIEND, Sir James, might have told you,” continued Custer, with significant emphasis.
“I have not seen Sir James for two months.”
“Well, Malcolm’s a crank–always was one, I reckon, and is reg’larly off his head now. Yes, sir; Scotch whiskey and your friend Sir James finished him. After that dinner at MacFen’s he was done for–went wild. Danced a sword-dance, or a strathspey, or some other blamed thing, on the table, and yelled louder than the pipes. So they all did. Jack, I’ve painted the town red once myself; I thought I knew what a first-class jamboree was: but they were prayer-meetings to that show. Everybody was blind drunk–but they all got over it except HIM. THEY were a different lot of men the next day, as cool and cautious as you please, but HE was shut up for a week, and came out crazy.”