In the Tideway — Key Ideas to Explore

There was a solemn pause. The advantages of Roederay seemed exhausted on all sides.

"If some one will give me his arm," said Lady Maud, rising, "I will go upstairs--to Paradise, perhaps, Mr. Lockhart. I really must say how do you do to our hostess before going on to the next."

"Any luck, Rick?" called a lady sitting on the doorstep of Eval House to a young man coming up the ferry-path. His rod was balanced level in his hand, his head bent forward against half a gale of wind, which, after sweeping the grass slopes into silvery waves, raced with white horses over the greener sea beyond. Yet on the doorstep, with the stone house betwixt you and the nor'west, the day was warm and still as any autumn day can be when a bright sun shines clear out of a brilliant blue sky.

She was a very small lady, looking all the smaller because the energy expressed in every line of face and figure suggested its adequacy for the direction of a far larger mass of matter. Looking still smaller at that particular moment by reason of her being overwhelmed by a fleecy lamb she was endeavouring to feed with a teapot. For the rest, a lady long past youth, yet with sufficient traces of it left to show that it had been pre-eminently attractive.

"Luck, Aunt Will? Why, yes, the best of luck. I've seen the most beautiful woman in the world."

"Who will that be now? And is it twenty or twenty-one you are next month? Twenty-one, is it--yes: time passes. Then as you are so near man's estate it won't be Maclead's niece from Glasgow; she is too red in the face. Nor Katie Macqueen; you've seen her too often. Nor me, either, Rick, though I used to be called that sometimes."

The transparent vanity in her tone made her nephew smile in his turn.

"It's no home-grown beauty, Aunt Will. It's a London belle,--Lady Maud Wilson. You should just--"

The sudden upset of a lamb, whose four pointed toes strove for foothold against his legs, checked further speech. His aunt, however, waving the teapot in her excitement, filled up the pause, aided by a sick gosling which had fluttered down from her lap as she rose.

"The Wilsons! Why didn't you tell me at once? Have they come at last? And why didn't they come before? And where are their servants? Why didn't they send word to the factor? And goody gracious me, Rick! what are they going to do?"

"If you'll put that teapot at a safer distance and prevent Baalam from making me curse utterly, I'll try and explain."

A minute of frantic shoving, joined by a chorus of hounds from within, and Miss Will Macdonald returned breathless to her seat on the steps, while the sick gosling fluttered to her lap once more.

"This is what I could gather. They have been deer-stalking with friends, because the grouse here were reported late. So they are, Aunt Will, I saw a covey yesterday--"

"Ahem! Well, their servants came by last _Clansman_; or rather they didn't, because--"

"Skip again. I know--too rough for her to put in--won't come till return trip. Go on, dear."

"How you do bustle a fellow! They expected cooks and scullions. All the show, in fact, including a but--"

"My dear aunt! you should have been a telegraph clerk. Well. Wrote for a machine to Carbost. Came along. Place shut up. Rick Halmar fishing sea pool. Saw signals of distress. Piloted 'em to harbour. Found Kirsty stacking peats. Lit the fire. Put on the kettle. Came home to tell his aunt. That is all, except that the factor is away to the Alan market and Kirsty has no English to speak of."

"They have servants with them of course?"

"A French maid. She is more solid than she looks. You see I had to help her out of the machine. She hadn't recovered the boat. They have been visiting about, and Mr. Wilson's man got left behind at Inverness, looking for lost luggage. Wired to say he would come on by the afternoon boat. Ha! ha! good joke, isn't it? Afternoon boat to Roederay. Now then, jump aboard! a penny all the way."

Miss Willina's sympathetic soul saw no cause for mirth in the vision conjured up by her housewifely imagination. She put on the deer-stalker cap lying on the step beside her. It was a signal for action, since, within the home precincts, she dispensed with any head covering save the thick masses of dark hair, which were still her greatest pride.

"I'll go over. Kirsty is an idiot, at best. She was six whole months learning the 'Happy Land' at Sunday-school.