Chapter 11

We all turned to the door to see the cause of this interruption. It was my sister Jessie who entered, and paused on the threshold as she observed the presence of a stranger. She wore no covering on her head, and her brown hair fell in natural curls on her shoulders and about her neck.

Captain Gordon rose politely and stood with his hands clasping the back of his chair. Jessie raised her large dark eyes towards him for a moment and looked confused.

I think this was the first time in my life that I felt conscious that my sister was more beautiful than any other Orkney girl I knew, with the one exception of Thora Kinlay. She was at that time nineteen years of age; she was tall and graceful, and very easy in her movements. It is true she had no accomplishments, such as those of Bailie Duke's daughters; but her education in Mr. Drever's school had been sound, and she could keep house as well as any fisherman's wife in Orkney, and row a boat as well as any lad.

"Was it Halcro ye were seeking, Jessie?" asked old Grace, as though my sister's presence there was a matter of as little concern to her as the presence of the old German clock in the corner of the room.

"Yea," said Jessie. "His dog came home without him, and we were feared he had gone ower the cliffs, or that some other mischance had happened him.

"Where have ye been, Halcro, so late as ye are? You should have been in your bed lang syne."

As I went to the nail for my cap, the dominie introduced Captain Gordon to Jessie. She greeted the sailor without ceremony--for in Orkney we are not demonstrative in this particular. But the officer held out his hand, and she took it with evident confusion. I think she could not have failed to notice the difference between this handsome young man and the gray-haired, toddy-drinking captains who usually came into Stromness and hung about our home in the Anchor Close.

Captain Gordon did not sit down again. Perhaps the mention of the name Ericson reminded him of his appointment with my father. But he had not yet effected his purpose of securing Grace Drever's cat, and he turned to the old woman, asking her again if she would part with Baudrons.

Grace, I do not doubt, had been impressed by the open-hearted bearing of the captain, and I had noticed his kindly way of addressing her, so that she might hear him without effort. But she looked fondly at her cat as he sat before the crimson fire, licking his lips after the fish bones he had eaten. Few mice or rats came in his way, but--luck for Baudrons--there was an abundance of fish, and the wild birds that Andrew brought home supplied him with many a stolen banquet.

There was one ruling passion in Baudrons, and that was his desire to gain possession of the noisy jackdaw which so often disturbed him with its steady shining eyes as they looked down at him from behind the wicker bars of the cage. I believe Baudrons anticipated the death of Peter as the crowning achievement of his life; and had he been consulted in the matter of the Lydia he might have shown some reluctance to enter the community of mice before he had compassed the jackdaw's death.

Grace was finally prevailed upon--much to the satisfaction of the dominie--to give up her cat; and it was arranged that I should take Baudrons out to the ship before school time on the following morning.

I was preparing to leave with Jessie and Captain Gordon, when Mrs. Drever called me to her near the fire.

"Come here, Halcro, laddie. Tak the peerie stone, see, and have a care that ye dinna lose it;" and she handed to me the little black stone.

Mr. Drever was standing beside her, and I looked to him to ask if I should take possession of this much of the viking's treasure.

"Take it, take it, Halcro," he said. "There can be no harm in your keeping it--at least until we find whether the authorities claim it or not. I canna think that there would be any money value in it to speak of. But you'd better be careful not to lose it at any rate."

"But the thing is of no use to me, sir, is it?" I asked.

"That's for you to find out, Halcro," said he. "You see it is a sort of charm, or amulet. The old Scandinavian vikings used to carry such things about with them, in the belief that by so doing they would be protected from all personal harm. Our Jarl Haffling, I suppose, wore this same amulet at his neck to ensure his safety through the perils of the battle and the storm. No doubt he believed that the possession of such a talisman gave him a charmed existence. The sea could not drown him, sword could not wound him, fortune favoured him, so long as he wore this little stone on his breast."

"And yet, sir, the Jarl Haffling came to his grave in the Bay of Skaill," I said incredulously.

"Ay, lad, so he did, so he did. But we must suppose that Odin, the god of the Norsemen, had thought it time to reward him by calling him off from his earthly battles to the Halls of Valhalla."

Captain Gordon here approached us, and whilst he and Mr. Drever were bidding each other goodnight, I stood looking into the fire, meditating upon the strange thing my schoolmaster had told me. I put the little stone securely into my breast pocket, feeling the new responsibility I bore in being guarded by such a mysterious influence; for I did not doubt that the protection given by my talisman to the dead viking would now be extended to myself.

Grace Drever had some instructions to give me regarding the taking away of her cat, and when I left her my sister Jessie and Captain Gordon were already walking together down the brae. I soon overtook them. Jessie was questioning the captain about his ship.

"Father was saying she's a very good ship," said she; "but I think mysel' that her masts are ower high; and if ye were taken in one o' the spring gales off the Orkneys you'd find that they are, Mr. Gordon."

"Did the pilot say that our masts are too high, Miss Ericson?" asked the captain.

"Nay, I was thinkin' it mysel'," said Jessie, "when I saw the barque lying near the Holms. High masts are good, I will allow, for carrying a heap o' sails, but our whaling ships never have masts so high as yours."

"Well, but you must understand," urged the sailor, "that we are not bound for Davis Straits as your whalers are that went out today. In the tropical seas, where there is often a calm lasting several days, we need high masts and widespread sails, Miss Ericson."

"Yes, I ken that well enough," argued Jessie. "But I have seen many a good ship wrecked on the Black Craigs in the spring time, and I can aye tell when a ship will come back safe to Stromness."

Captain Gordon seemed to treat my sister's criticism of his ship very lightly; but as events turned out, her warning was perhaps justifiable.

When we turned into the Anchor Close, we found my father standing at the house door, smoking his pipe and looking out for us.

"Where has the lad been?" he asked of Jessie before he greeted the captain.

"I found him up at the dominie's," she explained.

And then she held out her hand to Mr. Gordon.

"Fare ye well, Captain Gordon!" she said; "fare ye well, and a good voyage to you!"

And she glided past him into the house.

"Was the lass speakin' wi' you, skipper?" asked my father.

"Yes," said Gordon. "She was telling me that my barque's masts are too high."

"Ay! but it's no' sae often that she'll speak wi' a man. She's a blate lass wi' maist folk. But what kens she about a vessel's masts, I wonder?"

My father, with his hands deep in his trousers pockets, then stepped down to the jetty and looked through the darkness towards the Lydia.

"Ay, but I'm no that sure about it either, Skipper. The masts are higher than ordinary. But ye'll come ben the house and smoke a pipe, maybe?"

"Thank you, pilot, I don't mind--just for a half hour before I go out to the ship."

My father thereupon led the way within, and placed an easy chair for Mr. Gordon under the large hurricane lamp that hung from the low ceiling, and cast its yellow light about the room. The skipper glanced rapidly at the dark, old-fashioned furniture, at the high-backed chairs, cushioned with the skins of seals, the strong teak-wood sideboard, and the heavy round table, upon which stood a quaint Dutch spirit bottle and a couple of horn drinking cups. He looked at the several pictures of ships battling with terrible storms, and at the pensive porcupine in its dusty glass case, and then at the array of firearms and harpoons above the door of the press bed. My dog Selta lay sound asleep upon a large polar-bear skin before the fire. Had he approached her and looked up the wide chimney he might have seen there the remains of our winter stock of smoked geese and hams hanging in the midst of the "reek."

"I suppose you have been sailing foreign a good deal in your time, pilot?" said Mr. Gordon, when he was seated.

He had got this notion, no doubt, from having observed the many foreign ornaments and weapons about the room.

"No," said my father, "I hae never been abroad. All my life has been spent in the Mainland."

"You mean Scotland--the mainland of Scotland?" said the captain, not seeming to understand the meaning of the "Mainland," which I may here explain is our local name for Pomona island--the largest of the Orkneys.

"No, I didna mean Scotland, skipper--though, to be sure, I hae been over there many a time. We call this the Mainland, where we are just now. Many folks make the same mistake about that. I mind of a skipper named Jock Abernethy. Jock had a brig o' his ain, though he kent naething aboot navigation, whatever. Weel, a lang while past it is noo, he was takin' his brig frae Portree, in Skye, across to the West Indies. His crew was nae better nor himsel'. Weel, when they had been at sea twa or three months, Jock cam on deck ae mornin', and, 'Donald,' says he to his mate, 'd'ye not see land yonder to starboard?'

"'Ay, sir,' says Donald; 'I'm just thinkin' it will be the West Indies.'

"'You're right there, Donald, the West Indies it is,' says Jock. 'See, yonder's the black folk sittin' waitin' for us!' and he pointed to the cormorants perched on the rocks.

"So the brig was hauled round, and when she was near inshore a pilot boat cam oot to them. Jock hailed the pilot: 'What land is that?' he cried.

"'It's the Mainland!' sings out the pilot.

"'What! the mainland o' America?' asks Jock, thinkin' he had missed the Indies.

"'No, ye duffer, the Mainland o' Orkney, to be sure,' says the pilot. 'What other Mainland is there?'"

As I sat on my low stool by the fire, my mother and Jessie being in the inner room, I took the viking's charm from my pocket and examined it. Captain Gordon had lighted his pipe, and when my father's anecdote was finished he said:

"Now, Halcro, my lad, lay aft here and let us have another look at that magic stone of yours."

And then, as I handed it to him, he proceeded to tell my father of our discovery of the treasure.

The two men discussed the probable value of what we had found, and I felt some disappointment in their estimate of what the dominie might be able to sell the relics for.

"It is very good to find these things," said my father, blowing a mist of tobacco smoke from amidst his beard. "But what use are they, whatever? Nae use ava! The dominie might send them to the museum folk at Edinburgh, and he would get mebbe a pickle pounds for them--hardly enough for the lads to buy an auld boat wi'. I wouldna be bothered wi' the things."

"What was it the old woman was saying about this stone, though, Halcro?" asked the captain.

I repeated what Grace Drever told me--how the stone might protect me from accident and from the monsters of the sea; from the kraken and the kelpie, the warlocks and the wirracows; and how, having the charm at my neck, I need never fear climbing a cliff or entering upon the most dangerous adventure.

"And do you believe all this, my lad?" asked Captain Gordon, taking his pipe from his lips and addressing me.

"Well," I returned, with an earnestness that must have shown that I had not the smallest doubt upon the matter, "auld Grace Drever said it was 'as true as death,' and the dominie did not deny that it was 'just possible.' What for should I not believe it? and what for would the stone be bound with the gold ring and buried with the other gear if it were not of some value beyond ordinary?"

"Och! but I dinna doot there will be something in the stone," said my father, who, at the mention of the dominie's belief, cast away all questioning. "And it will not be the first time I have heard of such cantrips."

And he told us of a man named Willie Reoch, a fisherman, who was preserved from the great Bore of Papa Westray in some such way. Willie Reoch and three other fishers were away at the saith fishing, and when their boat was driven by the wind near to the Bore, they were drawn under by the whirling current and swamped. Reoch had round his neck a charm which Bessie Millie, the witch, had given to him, and so was the only one saved.

"Na, na," continued my father, "I dinna doot there will be something wondersome in the stone; and if any person would have such a thing, who would it be but the Norseman?"

Thus did I become convinced in my mind that, by the possession of that little gold-encircled stone, I bore a charmed life.

That night I lay with my precious talisman under my pillow. I thought of the events of the afternoon, and, remembering my fight with Tom Kinlay, attributed my victory over him to the influence which that talisman, then in my pocket, had already begun to work. I tried to imagine what kind of adventures had befallen the old viking whose bones we had disturbed, and wondered if I should ever encounter any similar perils. My opportunities of adventure were fewer than his could have been; but I determined to give my full trust to the mysterious aid in which Jarl Haffling had trusted in the ancient days. Then I heard my father unmooring the boat from the pier to take Captain Gordon out to his ship, and as the sound of the oars in the rowlocks died away in the night I fell asleep.