“Well, my boy,” said the old man, “you’ve come to tell us something. What is it?”
“Oh!” I replied, as lightly as I could, “it is simply that we are in for a row with Germany, and I’ve got a part in the play, so to speak. I’m enlisting.”
“Good boy,” he chuckled, “good boy! Applying for a commission, I suppose — man of your class and education, and all that — eh?”
“Oh, heavens, no!” I laughed. “I shall just walk on with the crowd, to continue the simile.”
“Glad to hear it, my boy — I am, indeed. ’Pon my soul, you’re a good lad, you know — quite a good lad. Your father would have been proud of you. He was a splendid fellow — a thundering splendid fellow. We always used to say, ‘You can always trust Ewart to do the straight, clean thing; he’s a gentleman.’ I hope your comrades will say the same of you, my boy.”
“By the way, sir,” I added, “I also intended to tell you that in the circumstances I — I —— Well, I mean to say that I shan’t — shan’t expect Myra to consider herself under — under any obligations to me.”
However difficult it was for me to say it, I had been quite certain that the old General would think it was the right thing to say, and would be genuinely grateful to me for saying it off my own bat without any prompting from him. So I was quite unprepared for the outburst that followed.
“You silly young fellow!” he cried. “’Pon my soul, you are a silly young chap, you know. D’you mean to tell me you came here intending to tell my little girl to forget all about you just when you are going off to fight for your country, and may never come back? You mean to run away and leave her alone with an old crock of a father? You know, Ewart, you — you make me angry at times.”
“I’m very sorry, sir,” I apologised, though I had no recollection of having made him angry before.
“Oh! I know,” he said, in a calmer tone. “Felt it was your duty, and all that — eh? I know. But, you see, it’s not your duty at all. No. Now, there are one or two things I want to tell you that you don’t know, and I’ll tell you one of ’em now and the rest later. The first thing — in absolute confidence, of course — is that —— ”
But at this point Myra walked in, and the General broke off into an incoherent mutter. He was a poor diplomatist.
“Ah! secrets? Naughty!” she exclaimed laughingly. “Are you ready, Ronnie?”
“He’s quite ready, my dear,” said the old man graciously. “I’ve said all I want to say to him for the time being. Run along with girlie, Ewart. You don’t want to mess about with an old crock.”
“Daddy,” said Myra reproachfully, “you’re not to call yourself names.”
“All right, then; I won’t,” he laughed. “You young people will excuse me, I’m sure. I should like to join you; but I have a lot of letters to write, and I daresay you’d rather be by yourselves. Eh? — you young dog!”
It was a polite fiction between father and daughter that when the old fellow felt too unwell to join her or his guests he “had a lot of letters to write.” And occasionally, when he was in the mood to overtax his strength, she would never refer to it directly, but often she would remark, “You know you’ll miss the post, daddy.” And they both understood. So we set out by ourselves, and I naturally preferred to be alone with Myra, much as I liked her father. We went out on to the verandah, and while I unpacked my kit Myra rewound her line, which had been drying on the pegs overnight.
“Are you content with small mercies, Ron?” she asked, “or do you agree that it is better to try for a salmon than catch a trout?”
“It certainly isn’t better to-day, anyway,” I answered. “I want to be near you, darling. I don’t want the distance of the pools between us. We might walk up to the Dead Man’s Pool, and then fish up stream; and later fish the loch from the boat. That would bring us back in nice time for dinner.”
“Oh! splendid!” she cried; and we fished out our fly-books. Her’s was a big book of tattered pig-skin, which reclined at the bottom of the capacious “poacher’s pocket” in her jacket. The fly-book was an old favourite — she wouldn’t have parted with it for worlds. Having followed her advice, and changed the Orange I had tied for the “bob” to a Peacock Zulu, which I borrowed from her, we set out.
“Just above the Dead Man’s Pool you get a beautiful view of Hilderman’s hideous hut,” Myra declared as we walked along. I may explain here that “Dead Man’s Pool” is an English translation of the Gaelic name, which I dare not inflict on the reader.
“See?” she cried, as we climbed the rock looking down on the gorgeous salmon pool, with its cool, inviting depths and its subtle promise of sport. “Oh! Ronnie, isn’t it wonderful?” she cried. “Almost every day of my life I have admired this view, and I love it more and more every time I see it. I sometimes think I’d rather give up my life than the simple power to gaze at the mountains and the sea.”
“Why, look!” I exclaimed. “Is that the window you meant?”
“Yes,” Myra replied, with an air of annoyance, “that’s it. You can see that light when the sun shines on it, which is nearly all day, and it keeps on reminding us that we have a neighbour, although the loch is between us. Besides, for some extraordinary reason it gets on father’s nerves. Poor old daddy!”
It may seem strange to the reader that anyone should take notice of the sun’s reflection on a window two and a quarter miles away; but it must be remembered that all her life Myra had been accustomed to the undisputed possession of an unbroken view.
“Anyhow,” she added, as she turned away, “we came here to fish. One of us must cross the stream here and fish that side. We can’t cross higher up, there’s too much water, and there’s no point in getting wet. I’ll go, and you fish this side; and when we reach the loch we’ll get into the boat. See, Sholto’s across already.”
And she tripped lightly from boulder to boulder across the top of the fall which steams into the Dead Man’s Pool, while I stood and admired her agile sureness of foot as one admires the graceful movements of a beautiful young roe. Sholto was pawing about in a tiny backwater, and trying to swallow the bubbles he made, until he saw his beloved mistress was intent on the serious business of fishing, and then he climbed lazily to the top of a rock, where he could keep a watchful eye on her, and sprawled himself out in the sun. I have fished better water than the Malluch river, certainly, and killed bigger fish in other lochs than the beautiful mountain tarn above Invermalluch Lodge; but I have never had a more enjoyable day’s sport than the least satisfying of my many days there.
There was a delightful informality about the sport at the Lodge. One fished in all weathers because one wanted to fish, and varied one’s methods and destination according to the day. There was no sign of that hideous custom of doing the thing “properly” that the members of a stockbroker’s house-party seem to enjoy — no drawing lots for reaches or pools overnight, no roping-in a gillie to add to the chance of sending a basket “south.” When there was a superfluity of fish the crofters and tenants were supplied first, and then anything that was left over was sent to friends in London and elsewhere. At the end of the day’s sport we went home happy and pleased with ourselves, not in the least depressed if we had drawn a blank, to jolly and delightful meals, without any formality at all. And if we were wet, there was a great drying-room off the kitchen premises where our clothes were dried by a housemaid who really understood the business. As for our tackle, we dried our own lines and pegged them under the verandah, and rewound them again in the morning, made up our own casts, and generally did everything for ourselves without a retinue of attendants. And thereby we enjoyed ourselves hugely.
Angus and Sandy, the two handy-men of the place, would carry the lunch-basket