A Knight of the Nets

CHRISTINA AND ANDREW

This confidence greatly troubled Christina; and as Sophy crossed the sands and vanished into the shadows beyond, a strange, sad presentiment of calamity oppressed her heart.  Being herself in the enthusiasm of a first love, she could not conceive such treachery possible as Sophy’s word seemed to imply.  The girl had always been petted, and yet discontented with her situation; and had often made complaints which had no real foundation, and which in brighter moods she was likely to repudiate.  And this night Andrew, instead of her Aunt Kilgour, was the object of her dissatisfaction—­that would be all.  To-morrow she would be complaining to Andrew of her aunt’s hard treatment of her, and Andrew would be whispering of future happiness in her ears.

Upon the whole, therefore, Christina thought it would be cruel and foolish to tell her brother a word of what Sophy had said.  Why should she disturb his serene faith in the girl so dear to him, until there was some more evident reason to do so?  He was, as his mother said, “very touchy” about Sophy, being well aware that the village did not approve of the changes in her dress, and of those little reluctances and reserves in her behaviour, which had sprung up inevitably amid the refinements and wider acquaintances of town life.

“And so many things happen as the clock goes round,” she thought.  “Braelands may say or do something that will put him out of favour.  Or he may take himself off to a foreign country—­he is gey fond of France and Germany too—­and Goodness knows he will never be missed in Fifeshire.  Or them behind may sort what flesh and blood cannot manage; so I will keep a close mouth anent the matter.  One may think what one dare not say; for words, once spoken, cannot be wiped out with a sponge—­and more’s the pity!”

Christina had also reached a crisis in her own life,—­a crisis so important, that it quite excused the apparent readiness with which she dismissed Sophy’s strange confidence.  For the feeling between Jamie Logan and herself had grown to expression, and she was well aware that what had hitherto been in a large measure secret and private to themselves, had this night become evident to others.  And she was not sure how Jamie would be received.  Andrew had saved his life in a sudden storm, and brought him to the Binnie cottage until he should be able to return to his own place.  But instead of going away, he had hired his time for the herring season to a Pittendurie fisherman; and every spare hour had found him at the Binnie cottage, wooing the handsome Christina.

The village was not unanimously in his favour.  No one could say anything against Jamie Logan; but he was a stranger, and that fact was hard to get over.  A man must serve a very strict and long probation to be adopted into a Fife fishing community, and it was considered “very upsetting” for an unkent man to be looking up to the like of Christina Binnie,—­a lass whose forbears had been in Pittendurie beyond the memory or the tradition of its inhabitants.

Janet also was not quite satisfied; and Christina knew this.  She expected her daughter to marry a fisherman, but at least one who owned his share in a good boat, and who had a house to take a wife to.  This strange lad was handsome and good-tempered; but, as she reflected, and not unfrequently said, “good looks and a laugh and a song, are not things to lippen to for housekeeping.”  So, on the whole, Christina had just the same doubts and anxieties as might trouble a fine lady of family and wealth, who had fallen in love with some handsome fellow whom her relatives were uncertain about favouring.

A week after Sophy’s visit, however, Jamie found the unconquerable hour in which every true love comes to its blossoming.  It was the Sabbath night, and a great peace was over the village.  The men sat at their doors talking in monosyllables to their wives and mates; the children were asleep; and the full ocean breaking and tinkling upon the shingly coast.  They had been at kirk together in the afternoon, and Jamie had taken tea with the Binnies after the service.  Then Andrew had gone to see Sophy, and Janet to help a neighbour with a sick husband; so Jamie, left with Christina, had seized gladly his opportunity to teach her the secret of her own heart.

Sitting on the lonely rocks, with the moonlit sea at their feet, they had confessed to each other how sweet it was to love.  And the plans growing out of this confession, though humble enough, were full of strange hope and happy dreaming to Christina.  For Jamie had begged her to become his wife as soon as he got his promised berth on the great Scotch line, and this event would compel her to leave Pittendurie and make her home in Glasgow,—­two facts, simply stupendous to the fisher-girl, who had never been twenty miles from her home, and to whom all life outside the elementary customs of Pittendurie was wonderful and a little frightsome.

But she put her hand in Jamie’s hand, and felt his love sufficient for whatever love might bring or demand.  Any spot on earth would be heaven to her with him, and for him; and she told him so, and was answered as women love to be answered, with a kiss that was the sweetness and confidence of all vows and promises.  Among these simple, straight-forward people, there are no secrecies in love affairs; and the first thing Jamie did was to return to the cottage with Christina to make known the engagement they had entered into.

They met Andrew on the sands.  He had been disappointed.  Sophy had gone out with a friend, and her aunt had seemed annoyed and had not asked him to wait.  He was counting up in his mind how often this thing had happened lately, and was conscious of an unhappy sense of doubt and unkindness which was entirely new to him.  But when Christina stepped to his side, and Jamie said frankly, “Andrew, your dear sweet sister loves me, and has promised to be my wife, and I hope you will give us the love and favour we are seeking,” Andrew looked tenderly into his sister’s face, and their smiles met and seemed to kiss each other.  And he took her hand between his own hands, and then put it into Jamie’s.

“You shall be a brother to me, Jamie,” he said; “and we will stand together always, for the sake of our bonnie Christina.”  And Jamie could not speak for happiness; but the three went forward with shining eyes and linked hands, and Andrew forgot his own fret and disappointment, in the joy of his sister’s betrothal.

Janet came home as they sat in the moonlight outside the cottage.  “Come into the house,” she cried, with a pretense of anger.  “It is high time for folk who have honest work for the morn to be sleeping.  What hour will you get to the week’s work, I wonder, Christina?  If I leave the fireside for a minute or two, everything stops but daffing till I get back again.  What for are you sitting so late?”

“There is a good reason, Mother!” said Andrew, as he rose and with Jamie and Christina went into the cottage.  “Here is our Christina been trysting herself to Jamie, and I have been giving them some good advice.”

“Good advice!” laughed Janet.  “Between you and Jamie Logan, it is the blind leading the blind, and nothing better.  One would think there was no other duty in life than trysting and marrying.  I have just heard tell of Flora Thompson and George Buchan, and now it is Christina Binnie and Jamie Logan.  The world is given up, I think, to this weary lad and lass business.”

But Janet’s words belied her voice and her benign face.  She was really one of those delightful women who are “easily persuaded,” and who readily accept whatever is, as right.  For she had naturally one of the healthiest of human souls; besides which, years had brought her that tender sagacity and gentleness, which does not often come until the head is gray and the brow furrowed.  So, though her words were fretful, they were negatived by her beaming smile, and by the motherly fashion in which she drew Christina to her side and held out her hand to Jamie.

“You are a pair of foolish bairns,” she said; “and you little know what will betide you both.”

“Nothing but love and happiness, Mother,” answered Jamie.

“Well, well! look for good, and have good.  I will not be one to ask after evil for you.  But mind one thing, Jamie, you are marrying a woman, and not an angel.  And, Christina, if you trust to any man, don’t expect over much of him; the very best of them will stumble once in a while.”

Then she drew forward the table, and put on the kettle and brewed some toddy, and set it out with toasted cake and cheese, and so drank, with cheerful moderation, to the health and happiness of the newly-promised lovers.  And afterwards “the books” were opened, and Andrew, who was the priest of the family, asked the blessing of the Infinite One on all its relationships.  Then the happiness that had been full of smiles and words became too deep for such expression, and they clasped hands and kissed each other “good night” in a silence, that was too sweetly solemn and full of feeling for the translation of mere language.

Before the morning light, Mistress Binnie had fully persuaded herself that Christina was going to make an unusually prosperous marriage.  All her doubts had fled.  Jamie had spoken out like a man, he had the best of prospects, and the wedding was likely to be something beyond a simple fisherman’s bridal.  She could hardly wait until the day’s work was over, and the evening far enough advanced for a gossiping call on her crony, Marget Roy.  Last night she had fancied Marget told her of Flora Thompson’s betrothal with an air of pity for Christina; there was now a delightful retaliation in her power.  But she put on an expression of dignified resignation, rather than one of pleasure, when she made known the fact of Christina’s approaching marriage.

“I am glad to hear tell of it,” said Marget frankly.  “Christina will make a good wife, and she will keep a tidy house, I’ll warrant her.”

“She will, Marget.  And it is a very important thing; far more so than folks sometimes think.  You may put godliness into a woman after she is a wife, but you can not put cleanliness; it will have to be born in her.”

“And so Jamie Logan is to have a berth from the Hendersons?  That is far beyond a place in Lowrie’s herring boats.”

“I’m thinking he just stopped with Lowrie for the sake of being near-by to Christina.  A lad like him need not have spent good time like that.”

“Well, Janet, it is a good thing for your Christina, and I am glad of it.”

“It is;” answered Janet, with a sigh and a smile.  “The lad is sure to get on; and he’s a respectable lad—­a Fifer from Kirkcaldy—­handsome and well-spoken of; and I am thinking the Line has a big bargain in him, and is proud of it.  Still, I’m feared for my lassie, in such an awful, big, wicked-like town as Glasgow.”

“She’ll not require to take the whole town in.  She will have her Bible, and her kirk, and her own man.  There is nothing to fear you.  Christina has her five senses.”

“No doubt.  And she is to have a floor of her own and all things convenient; so there is comfort and safety in the like of that.”

“What for are you worrying yourself then?”

“There’s contingencies, Marget,—­contingencies.  And you know Christina is my one lassie, and I am sore to lose her.  But ’lack a day! we cannot stop the clock.  And marriage is like death—­it is what we must all come to.”

“Well Janet, your Christina has been long spared from it.  She’ll be past twenty, I’m thinking.”

“Christina has had her offers, Marget.  But what will you?  We must all wait for the right man, or go to the de’il with the wrong one.”

Thus the conversation went on, until Janet had exhausted all the advantages and possibilities that were incident to Christina’s good fortune.  And perhaps it was out of a little feeling of weariness of the theme, that Marget finally reminded her friend that she would be “lonely enough wanting her daughter,” adding, “I was hearing too, that Andrew is not to be kept single much longer; and it will be what no one expects if Sophy Traill ever fills Christina’s shoes.”

“Sophy is well enough,” answered Janet with a touch of pride.  “She suits Andrew, and it is Andrew that has to live with her.”

“And you too, Janet?”

“Not I!  Andrew is to build his own bigging.  I have the life rent of mine.  But I shall be a deal in Glasgow myself.  Jamie has his heart fairly set on that.”

She made this statement with an air of prideful satisfaction that was irritating to Mistress Roy; and she was not inclined to let Janet enter anew into a description of all the fine sights she was to see, the grand guns of preachers she was to hear, and the trips to Greenock and Rothesay, which Jamie said “would just fall naturally in the way of their ordinary life.”  So Marget showed such a hurry about her household affairs as made Janet uncomfortable, and she rose with a little offence and said abruptly:—­

“I must be going.  I have the kirkyard to pass; and between the day and the dark it is but a mournful spot”

“It is that,” answered Marget.  “Folks should not be on the road when the bodiless walk.  They might be in their way, and so get ill to themselves.”

“Then good night, and good befall you;” but in spite of the benediction, Janet felt nettled at her friend’s sudden lack of interest.

“It was a spat of envy no doubt,” she thought; “but Lord’s sake! envy is the most insinuating vice of the lot of them.  It cannot behave itself for an hour at a time.  But I’m not caring! it is better to be envied than pitied.”

These reflections kept away the thought and fear of the “bodiless,” and she passed the kirkyard without being mindful of their proximity; the coming wedding, and the inevitable changes it would bring, filling her heart with all kinds of maternal anxieties, which in solitude would not be put aside for all the promised pride and éclat of the event.  As she approached the cottage, she met Jamie and Christina coming down the cliff-side together, and she cried, “Is that you, Jamie?”

“As far as I know, it’s myself, Mother,” answered Jamie.

“Then turn back, and I’ll get you a mouthful of bread and cheese.  You’ll be wanting it, no doubt; for love is but cold porridge to a man that has to pull on the nets all night.”

“You have spoken the day after the fair, Mother,” answered Jamie.  “Christina has looked well to me, and I am bound for the boats.”

“Well, well, your way be it.”

Then Christina turned back with her mother, and they went silently back to the cottage, their hearts being busy with the new hopes and happiness that had come into their hitherto uneventful lives.  But reticence between this mother and daughter was not long possible; they were too much one to have reserves; and neither being sleepy, they soon began to talk over again what they had discussed a hundred times before—­the wedding dress, and the wedding feast, and the napery and plenishing Christina was to have for her own home.  They sat on the hearth, before the bit of fire which was always necessary in that exposed and windy situation; but the door stood open, and the moon filled the little room with its placid and confidential light.  So it is no wonder, as they sat talking and vaguely wondering at Andrew’s absence, Christina should tell her mother what Sophy had said about Archie Braelands.

Janet listened with a dour face.  For a moment she was glad; then she lifted the poker, and struck a block of coal into a score of pieces, and with the blow scattered the unkind, selfish thoughts which had sprung up in her heart.

“It is what I expected,” she answered.  “Just what I expected, Christina.  A lassie dressed up in muslin, and ribbons, and artificial roses, isn’t the kind of a wife a fisherman wants—­and sooner or later, like goes to like.  I am not blaming Sophy.  She has tried hard to be faithful to Andrew, but what then?  Nothing happens for nothing; and it will be a good thing for Andrew if Sophy leaves him; a good thing for Sophy too, I’m thinking; and better is better, whatever comes or goes.”

“But Andrew will fret himself sorely.”

“He will; no doubt of that.  But Andrew has a good heart, and a good heart breaks bad fortune.  Say nothing at all to him.  He is wise enough to guide himself; though God knows! even the wisest of men will have a fool in his sleeve sometimes.”

“Would there be any good in a word of warning?  Just to prepare him for the sorrow that is on the road.”

“There would be no sense in the like of it.  If Andrew is to get the fling and the buffet, he will take it better from Sophy than from any other body.  Let be, Christina.  And maybe things will take a turn for the dear lad yet.  Hope for it anyhow.  Hope is as cheap as despair.”

“Folks will be talking anon.”

“They are talking already.  Do you think that I did not hear all this clash and clavers before?  Lucky Sims, and Marget Roy, and every fish-wife in Pittendurie, know both the beginning and the end of it.  They have seen this, and they have heard that, and they think the very worst that can be; you may be sure of that.”

“I’m thinking no wrong of Sophy.”

“Nor I. The first calamity is to be born a woman; it sets the door open for every other sorrow—­and the more so, if the poor lassie is bonnie and alone in the world.  Sophy is not to blame; it is Andrew that is in the fault.”

“How can you say such a thing as that, Mother?”

“I’ll tell you how.  Andrew has been that set on having a house for his wife, that he has just lost the wife while he was saving the siller for the house.  I have told him, and better told him to bring Sophy here; but nothing but having her all to himself will he hear tell of.  It is pure, wicked selfishness in the lad!  He simply cannot thole her to give look or word to any one but himself.  Perfect scand’lous selfishness!  That is where all the trouble has come from.”

“Whist, Mother!  He is most at the doorstep.  That is Andrew’s foot, or I am much mista’en.”

“Then I’ll away to Lizzie Robertson’s for an hour.  My heart is knocking at my lips, and I’ll be saying what I would give my last bawbee to unsay.  Keep a calm sough, Christina.”

“You need not tell me that, Mother.”

“Just let Andrew do the talking, and you’ll be all right.  It is easy to put him out about Sophy, and then to come to words.  Better keep peace than make peace.”

She lifted the stocking she was knitting, and passed out of one door as Andrew came in at the other.  He entered with that air of strength and capability so dear to the women of a household.  He had on his kirk suit, and Christina thought, as he sat down by the open window, how much handsomer he looked in his blue guernsey and fishing cap.

“You’ll be needing a mouthful and a cup of tea, Andrew?” she asked.

Andrew shook his head and answered pleasantly, “Not I, Christina.  I had my tea with Sophy.  Where is mother?”

“She is gone to Lizzie Robertson’s for an hour.  Her man is yet very badly off.  She said she would sit with him till the night turned.  Lizzie is most worn out, I’m sure, by this time.”

“Where is Jamie?”

“He said he was going to the fishing.  He will have caught his boat, or he would have been back here again by this hour.”

“Then we are alone?  And like to be for an hour? eh, Christina?”

“There will be no one here till mother comes at the turn of the night.  What for are you asking the like of them questions, Andrew?”

“Because I have been seeking this hour.  I have things to tell you, Christina, that must never go beyond yourself; no, not even to mother, unless the time comes for it.  I am not going to ask you to give me your word or promise.  You are Christina Binnie, and that is enough.”

“I should say so.  The man or woman who promises with an oath is not to be trusted.  There is you and me, and God for our witness.  What ever you have to say, the hearer and the witness is sufficient.”

“I know that.  Christina, I have been this day to Edinburgh, and I have brought home from the bank six hundred pounds.”

“Six hundred pounds, Andrew!  It is not believable.”

“Whist, woman! I have six hundred pounds in my breast pocket, and I have siller in the house beside.  I have sold my share in the ‘Sure-Giver,’ and I have been saving money ever since I put on my first sea-boots.”

“I have always thought that saving money was your great fault, Andrew.”

“I know.  I know it myself only too well.  Many’s the Sabbath day I have been only a bawbee Christian, when I ought to have put a shilling in the plate.  But I just could not help it.”

“Yes, you could.”

“Tell me how, then.”

“Just try and believe that you are putting your collection into the hand of God Almighty, and not into a siller plate.  Then you will put the shilling down and not the bawbee.”

“Perhaps.  The thought is not a new one to me, and often I have forced myself to give a white shilling instead of a penny-bit at the kirk door, just to get the better of the de’il once in a while.  But for all that I know right well that saving siller is my besetting sin.  However, I have been saving for a purpose, and now I am most ready to take the desire of my heart.”

“It is a good desire; I am sure of that, Andrew.”

“I think it is; a very good one.  What do you say to this?  I am going to put all my siller in a carrying steamer—­one of the Red-White fleet.  And more to it.  I am to be skipper, and sail her from the North Sea to London.”

“Will she be a big boat, Andrew?”

“She will carry three thousand ‘trunks’ of fish in her ice chambers.  What do you think of that?”

“I am perfectly dazzled and dumbfoundered with the thought of it.  You will be a man of some weight in the world, when that comes to pass.”

“I will be Captain Binnie, of the North Sea fleet, and Sophy will have reason enough for her muslins, and ribbons, and trinkum-trankums—­God bless her!”

“You are a far forecasting man, Andrew.”

“I have been able to clear my day and my way, by the help of Providence, so far,” said Andrew, with a pious reservation; “just as my decent kirk-going father was before me.  But that is neither here nor there, and please God, this will be a monumental year in my life.”

“It will that.  To get the ship and the wife you want, within its twelve bounds, is a blessing beyond ordinary.  I am proud to hear tell of such good fortune coming your way, Andrew.”

“Ay; I knew you would.  But I have the siller, and I have the skill, and why shouldn’t I lift myself a bit?”

“And Sophy with you?  Sophy will be an ornament to any place you lift her to.  And you may come to own a fishing fleet yourself some day, Andrew!”

“I am thinking of it,” he answered, with the air of a man who feels himself master of his destiny.  “But come ben the house with me, Christina.  I have something to show you.”

So they went together into an inner room, and Andrew moved aside a heavy chest of drawers which stood against the wall.  Then he lifted a short plank beneath them, and putting his arm far under the flooring, he pulled forth a tin box.

The key to it was in the leather purse in his breast pocket, and there was a little tantalizing delay in its opening.  But when the lid was lifted, Christina saw a hoard of golden sovereigns, and a large roll of Bank of England bills.  Without a word Andrew added the money in his pocket to this treasured store, and in an equal silence the flooring and drawers were replaced, and then, without a word, the brother and sister left the room together.

There was however a look of exultation on Christina’s face, and when Andrew said “You understand now, Christina?” she answered in a voice full of tender pride.

“I have seen.  And I am sure that Andrew Binnie is not the man to be moving without knowing the way he is going to take.”

“I am not moving at all, Christina, for three months or perhaps longer.  The ship I want is in dry dock until the winter, and it is all this wealth of siller that I am anxious about.  If I should go to the fishing some night, and never come back, it would be the same as if it went to the bottom of the sea with me, not a soul but myself knowing it was there.”

“But not now, Andrew.  You be to tell me what I am to do if the like of that should happen, and your wish will be as the law of God to me.”

“I am sure of that, Christina.  Take heed then.  If I should go out some night and the sea should get me, as it gets many better men, then you will lift the flooring, and take the money out of hiding.  And you will give Sophy Traill one half of all there is.  The other half is for mother and yourself.  And you will do no other way with a single bawbee, or the Lord will set His face against it.”

“I will do just what you tell me.”

“I know it.  To think different, would be just incredible nonsense.  That is for the possibilities, Christina.  For the days that are coming and going, I charge you, Christina Binnie, never to name to mortal creature the whereabouts of the money I have shown you.”

“Your words are in my heart, Andrew.  They will never pass my lips.”

“Then that is enough of the siller.  I have had a happy day with Sophy, and O the grace of the lassie!  And the sweet innocence and lovesomeness of her pretty ways!  She is budding into a very rose of beauty!  I bought her a ring with a shining stone in it, and a gold brooch, and a bonnie piece of white muslin with the lace for the trimming of it; and the joy of the little beauty set me laughing with delight.  I would not call the Queen my cousin, this night.”

“Sophy ought to love you with all her heart and soul, Andrew.”

“She does.  She has arled her heart and hand to me.  I thank The Best for this great mercy.”

“And you can trust her without a doubt, dear lad?”

“I have as much faith in Sophy Traill, as I have in my Bible.”

“That is the way to trust.  It is the way I trust Jamie.  But you’ll mind how ready bad hearts and ill tongues are to give you a sense of suspicion.  So you’ll not heed a word of that kind, Andrew?”

“Not one.  The like of such folk cannot give me a moment’s trouble—­there was Kirsty Johnston—­”

“You may put Kirsty Johnston, and all she says to the wall.”

“I’m doing it; but she called after me this very evening, ’take care of yourself, Andrew Binnie.’  ‘And what for, Mistress?’ I asked.  ’A beauty is hard to catch and worse to keep,’ she answered; and then the laugh of her!  But I didn’t mind it, not I; and I didn’t give her word or look in reply; for well I know that women’s tongues cannot be stopped, not even by the Fourth Commandment.”

Then Andrew sat down and was silent, for a happiness like his is felt, and not expressed.  And Christina moved softly about, preparing the frugal supper, and thinking about her lover in the fishing boats, until, the table being spread, Andrew drew his chair close to his sister’s chair, and spreading forth his hands ere he sat down, said solemnly;—­

“This is the change of Thy Right Hand, O Thou Most High!  Thou art strong to strengthen; gracious to help; ready to better; mighty to save, Amen!”

It was the prayer of his fathers for centuries—­the prayer they had used in all times of their joy and sorrow; the prayer that had grown in his own heart from his birth, and been recorded for ever in the sagas of his mother’s people.