The Silver Darlings

by Neil M. Gunn

  “What?”

  “Very likely,” said Finn with a serious air, “there will be boats over again from the south side.”

  “Very likely,” she said, with an innocent air.

  “Quite so. Special boats with special crews.”

  “Will there?” She arched her brows.

  Would he make her weep? He would. She deserved it. “Extra special crews, with names like Beel and Jock and—and Andie. A nice name, Andie, don’t you think?”

  She leaned back, laughing. She doubled over, laughing. “Oh, you’re funny!” she spluttered.

  Finn didn’t feel funny. “I think all girls are a bit queer, myself.” And when she laughed again, he felt piqued.

  “Oh, dear,” she sighed; “that was a good laugh!”

  “It didn’t cost much, anyway,” he said breezily.

  “Oh, don’t make me laugh again,” she begged him. “Don’t!” Her body, like an opening bud, was immature and tender, a little stiff, but it was full of young life bursting through its restraints, exaggeratedly, but somehow very attractively, too. He helped himself to a snuff.

  “Why do you think girls are queer?” she asked.

  “I don’t know why they’re queer, I’m sure,” he answered. “It’s probably the nature of the animal.”

  She neither laughed nor protested, but kept her head down, picking at the heather. “Sometimes they may have to do things they don’t want to do.”

  “Have they?” He laughed, out of a great and amusing knowledge. “If so, they hide it very well!” She did not answer. “They hide it so well,” said Finn humorously, “that no one would ever suspect it!”

  She did not answer. His eyes followed her hand, that seemed nervous, as if her young thought was too deep for utterance. He looked at her head, the parting of her dark hair, the red silk ribbon he had given her keeping it in place. The virgin’s snood. A faint warmth went over him, a tenderness for this young cousin of his. As if she felt his eyes, she lifted her head and looked down over the birches and away to the mountains.

  “Doesn’t the world feel young to-day?” asked Finn in his pleasant voice.

  She did not answer for a moment; then she said, “It seems to me very old and wrinkled. It’s we who are young.”

  Finn checked his laugh, in a marvelling astonishment. “You have the wisdom of an old woman!”

  She glanced at him quickly, smiling. “Come on, we’ll go.”

  In no time Barbara was as interested in the world as a young butterfly. She was attracted by the smallest things, as if the journey were a thrilling adventure. Often they walked in silence. At the Grey Hen’s Well, Barbara drank twice. “Once for Auntie Catrine and once for myself,” she murmured, wiping the water from her nose.

  “Why that?” he asked, astonished.

  “This is where your mother rested,” she said, “long, long ago, when for the first time she crossed the Ord and entered into a strange land.”

  He smiled at her legendary tone, but he saw, too, that there was something behind it and, whatever it was, all in a moment it touched his heart. So he got down and drank—hesitated—and drank a second time.

  “Tell me,” she said, glowing, “—for what?”

  But he shook his head mysteriously and went on.

  “Oh, Finn, do!” she pleaded, and hung on to his arm. “Do.”

  “No.”

  “That’s not fair. I told you.” She tugged him; she held him back. Her bundle fell from his shoulder as he jerked her forward by the wrist in a rush against him. His arms held her close. “I have you now,” he said. “Do you promise to come quietly?” Her struggles ceased. His eyes went over the lonely stretches of moor and hill. “Do you promise?”

  “Yes.”

  He let her go. She did not look at him. She was flushed, but before either of them could think, she cried, “You’re mean.”

  “How?”

  “Not telling me.”

  He laughed and tried to speak in the most ordinary tone, “Well, I’ll tell you.”

  “Promise it’s the truth?”

  “Yes. Cut my throat and burn my breath.”

  She laughed excitedly at his gesture.

  He hesitated. “I don’t know if I will.”

  “Oh, you promised!”

  He acted reluctance for a little longer, then he began to speak in a simple, brotherly way as they walked together, of the sea and boats and the rise of the fishing, how this brought money and comfort to the poor, dispossessed people, and how fine life was going to be on this coast yet. “And so,” he concluded, letting his great secret out in an easy tone, “I have been thinking of getting a boat of my own.”

  “Have you?” she said. “Wouldn’t that be fine?”

  “Do you think so?” he asked lightly, his ear eager for her wonder.

  “I do. I think it would be grand,” she declared.

  But his ear did not catch the inner tone of wonder, the hush of surprise.

  “It’s not settled, so you mustn’t say anything about it. After all, I mightn’t bother.”

  “But you should,” she insisted. “I hope you do. You will, won’t you?”

  “I’ll see,” he said.

  “I would like you to have a boat of your own. That would be fine!”

  “It just occurred to me. But we’ll see. Are you feeling tired?”

  “Me? No,” she declared, with a look at him.

  He was going to have suggested a rest, but now he went on walking, talking about several things amusingly. The delicate feeling of harmony between them had gone, and presently, after a silence, when he asked with dry humour, “What are you thinking about?” she answered quietly, without looking at him, “I was thinking about your boat.”

  This irritated him, so he laughed and asked, “What wonderful thing were you expecting me to say—instead of about the boat?”

  She did not answer.

  “Come on!” he teased her. “Tell me.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about anything else.”

  “You were. I know you were.”

  “I was not,” she said.

  “Ah, do, Barbara. Tell me. Please.” He took her arm. But she snatched it from him. He laughed, and she went walking on alone. He followed, without making any effort to overtake her. Her body was slim and straight, from her bare heels to the crown of her head. He began to make mocking noises in his throat. She sat down, turning her face to the sea. He walked past, remarking politely on the fine weather. In time they grew friendly again. Just before they came to the top of the last rise, he paused, saying, “Now for the first glimpse of the home of your heart!” She hesitated half a second, and ran on.

  There it was! He looked sideways, with a smile, at her eager face. “Come on!” she cried and began running; then waited for him.

  “Run on,” he said. “Don’t wait for me.”

  “You’re a great big fool,” she said.

  “Ho-ho! Why so?”

  “Just because you are.”

  “Enjoyed your walk?”

  “Yes, very much. Did you?”

  “In bits,” he said. “Bits.”

  “What bits?”

  “If you tell me what bit you enjoyed best, I’ll tell you my bit.”

  “I enjoyed many bits,” she said.

  “So did I,” he answered.

  “Tell me,” she begged.

  “No. It’s you first.”

  “Will you guess what bit I thought best and then I’ll guess what bit you thought best?”

  “You guess first.”

  She suddenly looked at him, not shyly but in a penetrating glance, with a surprising touch of devilment in it. A certain warmth beset him inwardly, for his mind was running on the moment when he had held her. She looked away. “There’s Uncle Angus!” she cried.

  “Ho-ho!” he mocked. “You’re frightened!”

  She turned her head and gave him the same glance. “I’m not guessing,” she said. “I know—now. It was when you spoke o
f your boat,” and she ran down the brae-face shouting, “Uncle Angus!”

  Finn felt the bottom of the warmth fall out of him.

  *

  There was a big change in Dale since the day Catrine had walked out of it. Not that much extra land had been taken into cultivation, for the small plot given to each croft could not grow in size, unless upward into the mountain rock. But the lazy beds, heavy with ripening grain and freshly coloured with the potato flower, lay against the hill-side in an attractive pattern of straight line and serpent twist, like a great quilt. There were more houses, too, small two-roomed thatched cottages, with little or no land attached to them. The real change lay in the comfort of the folk, which they harvested not from the land but from the sea. Many of the young men had left Dale and were living permanently in the rapidly growing village of Helmsdale. They all had a hunger for a bit of land, but seeing it could not be got, they gave more and more their whole attention to the sea. A row of potatoes here and there on a croft each would have, and he gave harvest labour for it, but he now bought his oatmeal. With fresh fish, salt fish, a barrel of cured herring, meal, potatoes, and—for the greater part of the year—milk, butter, and cheese, life was given a solid backing that neither chance nor mischance could affect greatly. A side of a pig, a barrel of porter, meat on more than one day of the week, syrup, eatables bought out of a shop, would be encountered in many a place, and when there was no milk for porridge, children grew excited over the change to treacle, nursing the dark spoonful in the centre of the plate. The rise of the fishing had pushed poverty from the door and beyond the little fields, and though its spectre might haunt the mind now and then, there was a good way of dealing with it, especially when a stranger came, like Finn. It was the hand into the store of hidden shillings then and swift feet for “something special” to the shop. For the women were jealous of hospitality’s good name and, to come near the truth, they would indulge in hospitality as men on a market or settling-day would indulge in drink. They loved it, its carefree giving, its talk, its laughter, its swept house, its clean table, its bright face, its delicate pride. “Is it yourself, Finn? How pleased I am to see you! Come away in!”

  And Finn knew how to take it all, with a bright voice, a merry retort, a quick movement or sympathetic word, so that they were delighted to see him. He seemed to have relations in swarms, and he wondered if the shillings he had taken with him would cover the youngest of them.

  Catrine’s mother was now well over seventy, and she looked at her grandson with the clear eyes that saw not only his straight young manhood but the nature of the spirit behind. He knew he was being assessed but did not feel uncomfortable, for the expression of her eyes was kindly, and when she went on talking it was satisfied and fulfilled. He enjoyed the responses that rose in him, an ease of manners, a clearness in the voice. There was an essence of the spirit somewhere that was delicate yet full of life, the gaiety and hope in life, like a song running in the mind. Now and then in little surges it brought a great desire to be generous.

  But there was no fear of the spirit taking wings. It was held to the earth by a heavy enlargement of the stomach. Finn had to eat here and he had to eat there until he said to a cousin of his, “As sure as death, if I eat any more I’ll burst.” So they crossed into Helmsdale where there were greetings and talk and more food than ever. Finn went over the harbour, looking at the boats, agreeing that Helmsdale was far better equipped as a curing station than Dunster, and saying solemnly, “How is it, then, that Dunster so outstripped Helmsdale? It can only be the one thing.” “What’s that?” “The quality of the men,” said Finn. But his Uncle Norman and a few other fishermen did not let him off with that. Then someone mentioned Stornoway, and they turned on Finn in a body, eager to listen to him. But he had no sooner begun than Isebeal appeared, declaring that she could not wait any longer, and carried Finn off, for she was dying to hear about Catrine who was her life’s heroine.

  Within half an hour, however, the men began to file into Isebeal’s kitchen until it was packed, and then Norman said, “You’ll begin at the beginning, Finn.” The ceilidh was set and Finn began.

  It took him two hours to describe the trip, for he was listened to by experts both in boat-sailing and story-telling, who let him off with nothing. “We left on the Tuesday morning. It was a good morning, clear and bright, with a fine breeze off the land; so we put both sails up and set our course on Clyth Head.” “How was the tide?” asked Norman. So Finn described the state of the tide, explaining how necessary it is to get the first of the ebb through the Pentland Firth if you hope to get through at all. “In fact, when we got there——” But Norman pulled him up. “We’ll come to that,” he said. In this way, any self-consciousness that Finn might have, talking before so many people, was taken from him and he entered into the telling of the whole story as if it were happening before his eyes, which indeed it was. When the wind died away and they got on to the oars, feeling now they would never make the Pentland in time, Finn communicated the anxiety that came over them in a vivid manner by introducing bits of talk between Rob and Callum. He interrupted his story to describe Rob and Callum, and this light relief in the tension of the race for the tide was greatly appreciated. They laughed. They repeated the sarcastic or witty saying. In fact, Finn himself found that something which had not appeared very comical at the time seemed now the very essence of the comical. Then back to the oars, straining at the oars. Would they make it? “It did not seem like it,” said Finn. Their eyes were on him. An old man, who had been a drover in the days before the clearances, sat with his chin on the crook of his stick, his eyes burning under hooded brows. Boys were grouped spellbound on the floor. He had not yet started his story and they were frightened he would hurry.

  It took him a long time to get through the Pentland, and indeed to satisfy men like Norman he drew a chart of the passage with his finger on the floor. The swiftness of the tide like a mighty river, the ripps and boils. “The boat goes from you,” said Finn, “as your heels go from you on a bit of ice.” They shook their heads. The wonder of the world was without end. The Wells of Swinna and the need to throw a chest overboard enthralled not only the young. “Get your chest ready, Rob,” said Callum. “Take your own chest,” said Rob; “there will be more food for his belly in it, if I know you.”

  The night in Loch Eriboll, the fun of the milk-hunt, the departure, the Cape, the Minch, the short strong waves, the mist. “We were lost,” said Finn.

  The night of storm and the great long seas.

  He laid Henry’s and Roddie’s theories of where they might be before the seamen around him. “You see how difficult it was?” he asked with an eager smile. “No land, nothing but these tremendous seas coming at you like the hills of Kildonan, with great straths between. In the darkness of that night there were many times when I thought she was away with it.” “She had a great seaman at her helm,” said Norman. “That’s true,” agreed Finn. “Roddie was great. He sat there like one of the Vikings of old, never moving, only his eyes watching, hour after hour, through the dark of the night and the long hours of next day.” They saw him and were deeply moved by the ring in Finn’s voice.

  This was one of the old stories, going from wonder to wonder, for now a ship appeared on these lonely wastes, and Finn said the sight of her frightened him a little. His voice grew modest, with a smile in it, but most of them had known Tormad well and they liked this reticence in his son. They were greatly relieved to find she was a friendly cod-smack and lingered over the vision of her ploughing into the Western Ocean. “The Shetlanders are daring seamen.” “They are known for it.” They nodded their heads.

  “So we thanked them, and Roddie, watching his chance, put her about in the running seas, and we bore off, and at that the whole crew lined the deck and gave us a loud cheer.”

  His listeners shifted restlessly. “You deserved it,” said Norman; “I’ll say that.” “You did indeed.” “Yes, yes.” They took a moment or two to settle, for t
hey were moved strongly. But Finn had them laughing at the way they now decided to celebrate in drinks the emergence from their troubles, quoting Callum and Rob to suit his purpose. “It’s a terrible thing, thirst,” said Finn. And he smiled, describing the way it attacks a man. And then—then they saw land. “Callum fairly revived at that!”

  He would! He would indeed! And it was not before time!

  And so Finn brought them, not to land, but to a place of dark fantastic rock, and anchored them there.

  Never before had Finn known the power of the storyteller. The smashing seas, the screaming birds, the black rock-faces, and the terrible thirst that had come upon them. Someone would have to try to climb the rock. “For we saw that by the morning it might be too late.”

  The rock-face, the mystery of the little house, and—the water. The rock-ledges, the birds, and his astonishment at the bite that nearly put him over the cliff. They laughed in relief at that. And then his problem over getting the eggs and bottles down the rock. “I was completely stuck,” said Finn, “and I was anxious, too. I didn’t know what to do. I hated to be beaten. And they were not the sort of things you could throw down!”

  This was a story and more than a story, and when at long last Finn brought them to the Sulaire and the silver darlings, that last surprise of all had their eyes shining in wonder and satisfaction.

  The night was now far advanced, but the listeners were only settling down, for Norman and the fishermen wanted to hear what happened in Stornoway and to ask a hundred questions. But Isebeal said no, Finn would have to go, for Granny would be sitting up for him.

  “Be quiet, woman,” said her husband. “The night is young.” Who bothered with time, anyway? “Sit down, Finn boy.”

  “No, I’ll have to be going,” said Finn. “I’d better be going.”

  “Nonsense. Never mind that woman. She would have to be putting her word in.”

  “Finn will come back to-morrow night,” said Isebeal, “and he can stay till all hours then.”