Part 25 (1/2)
CHAPTER XV
IN THE MOORLANDS
I was in bed, there was no doubt about that, and a strange sort of bed too, for it moved lightly and deliciously through the keen, open air like the magic carpet of the Eastern tale. The bedposts at my feet were most curiously carved into life-like images of warriors, so life-like, indeed, that when the one on the right turned its s.h.a.ggy head and spoke to the one on the left, I was not shocked and scarcely surprised. Bed it was, however, for mother's soft, smooth hand was on my cheek, and under the balm of its touch I went off to sleep again.
When my eyes opened again, the mists had cleared out of them and I was no longer in the land of shadows. The carven bedposts were Highlanders; the bed was a litter slung between four of them; the touch was hers. Somebody spoke, the Highlanders came to a halt, and Margaret bent over me. Her face was pale, grave, and anxious.
”Are you better, Oliver?” she whispered.
”As right as rain,” I answered, pus.h.i.+ng my new trouble behind me and speaking stoutly because of the whiteness of her face.
”Try to sleep again. You've had a bad fall, and there's an ugly cut in your skull.”
”Indeed, I'll do no such thing,” was my reply. ”I don't want carrying like a great baby, and I do want my breakfast. I'm as empty as a drum.”
”Can you stand?”
”Sure of it, and also hop, skip, jump, and, above all, eat and drink with any man alive. So, if you can make these men-women understand you, tell them I'm very grateful, but I've had enough.”
The four tousled warriors were easily made to understand what I wanted, and, stout and strong as they were, welcomed the end of their labours with broad grins of satisfaction. They lowered me to the ground, and immediately Margaret's hands were outstretched to help me to my feet. But for the black death between us, it would have been new life indeed to see the colour and suns.h.i.+ne creeping back to her face, and to hear her whispered ”Thank G.o.d!”
My head was b.u.mming and throbbing, but nothing to speak of. The gash was behind and above my right ear, so I must have somersaulted down the stairs. Margaret, as I learned later, had bathed and bandaged the wound, and after my recovery of consciousness, it only gave me the happy trouble of persuading Margaret that it gave me no trouble.
I stamped and shook myself experimentally, took a few strides, and jumped once or twice, Margaret watching me as curiously and carefully as a hen watches her first chicken.
”Do mind, Oliver!” she said. ”It bled horribly, and you'll start it again.”
”I believe I needed a blood-letting,” said I.
”Should you ever need another,” she said crisply, ”I hope you'll take it in the usual way. How did it happen?”
I had steeled myself for the inevitable question, and so answered ruefully, ”I must have tripped over the domino.”
”If it were not your mother's I would never wear it again,” she said, plucking the skirt of it into her hand and shaking it as if it were a naughty child. ”I thought you would never come round. For nearly an hour, I should think, you looked stone-dead. Then you just opened your eyes, but closed them before I dared speak, and lay so at least another hour. You have given me such a fright, sir, that, now you are up and about again, I'm beginning to feel I have a grievance against you.”
”I'm sorry, madam,” said I, very soberly.
”Now you're laughing at me, sir,” was the brisk reply.
The word made me s.h.i.+ver. ”Laughing”--over Jack's body! Margaret was in her stride back to her mistress-s.h.i.+p again yet her eye changed instantly with her mood when she saw me wince. Indeed, her mind flashed after my mind like a hawk after a pigeon, but I dodged the trouble by looking casually around to examine our whereabouts.
We were following a track down a dip in an open moorland. Across the shallow valley, and climbing the slope ahead of us, was another small body of Highlanders, whom I took to be our scouting party. The sun was a dim blob in the sky, and I saw from its position that our direction was easterly. A joyous hail from behind made me spin round, whereupon I saw the Colonel on Sultan and the young Chief on the sorrel turning the brow behind us. It took them a few minutes to trot down to us, and before they reached us four more wild warriors, our rear-guard apparently, came in view. One of them was my son of Anak, astride Margaret's mare, and so looking more gigantesque than ever.
”Good morning, commander!” was the Colonel's greeting. ”Slids! But I'm glad to see you on your feet again. How's the head?”
”It still b.u.mbles a bit,” said I, ”but, truth to tell, I'm thinking more of my breakfast than my head. I'm as empty as a drum.”
”It's a guid prognostick to feel hungry after sic a crack o' the head,”
said the chieftain, smiling, and I thought with a twinge what a handsome, wholesome sight he made.