Harry Milvaine Part 13

He now got a small bag out of the cupboard, and into this he put a change of clothes. Having washed and dressed, he was ready for the road.

He opened his door quietly, and walked silently along the pa.s.sage, boots in hand. He had to pa.s.s his mother's room door. His heart beat high, it thumped against his ribs so that he could almost hear it. How he would have liked to have gone in, and kissed his dear mother good-bye!

But he dared not.

Not until he was quite out of doors among the snow did he put on his boots. Eily, not knowing him, made a rush, barking and fiercely growling.

"Hush, Eily! hus.h.!.+" he cried; "it's me, it's Harry, your master."

Eily changed her tune now, and also her att.i.tude. The hair that had been standing up all along her back was smoothed down at once, and as the boy bent to tie his boots she licked his hands and cheek. The poor dog seemed really to know that something more than usual was in the wind.

There was a glimmer of light in the east, but the stars everywhere else were still very bright.

Harry stood up.

Eily sat motionless, looking eagerly up into his face, and her eyes sparkled in the starlight.

She was waiting for her master's invitation to go along with him. One word would have been enough to have sent her wild with joy.

"Where can he be going?" she was asking herself. "Not surely to the forest at this time of night! But wherever he goes, I'll go too."

"Eily," said the boy, seriously, even sadly, "I'm going away, far, far away."

The dog listened, never moving ear nor tail.

"And, Eily, you _cannot_ come with me, dear, dear doggie."

Eily threw herself at his feet, or rather fell; she looked lost in grief.

He patted her kindly.

This only made matters worse. She thought he was relenting, that his words had been only spoken in fun. She jumped up, sprang on his shoulder, licked his ear, then went gambolling round and round him, and so made her way to the gate.

It was very apparent, however, that all these antics were a.s.sumed, there was no joy at the dog's heart. She was but trying to overcome her master's scruples to take her along with him.

Harry followed her to the gate.

"It must not be, Eily," he said again; "I'm going where you cannot come.

But I will come back, remember that."

His hand was on her head, and he was gazing earnestly down at her.

"Yes, I'll come back in a few months, and you will meet me, oh! so joyfully. Then we'll roam and rove and run in the beautiful forest once more, and fish by the river, and shoot on the moorland and hill.

Goodbye, Eily. Be good, and watch. Good-bye, goodbye."

A great tear fell on Eily's mane as he bent down and kissed her brow.

Eily stood there by the gate in the starlight, watching the dark retreating figure of her beloved young master, until a distant corner hid him from view, and she could see him no more.

Then she threw herself down on the snow; and, reader, if you could have heard the big, sobbing sigh she gave, you would believe with me, that the mind of a dog is sometimes almost human, and their griefs and sorrows very real.

Hastily brus.h.i.+ng the tears from his eyes, Harry made the best of his way along the road, not daring to look behind him, lest his feelings should overcome him.

He kept repeating to himself the words he had heard his uncle make use of the evening before. This kept his courage up. When he had gone about a mile he left the main road and turned into a field. A little winding church-path soon brought him to a wooded hollow, where there was a very tiny cottage and garden.

He opened the gate and entered.

He went straight to the right-hand window, and, wetting his forefinger, rubbed it up and down on the pane.

The noise it made was enough to awaken some one inside, for presently there was a cough, and a voice said--

"Who's there?"

"It is I, Andrew: rise, I want to speak to you."

"Man! is it you, Harry? I'll be out in a jiffy."

And sure enough a light was struck and a candle lit. Harry could see poor faithful Andrew hurrying on his clothes, and in two minutes more he had opened the door and admitted his young friend.

"Man! Harry," he said, "you scared me. You are early on the road.

Have ye traps set in the forest? D'ye want me to go wi' ye?"

"No such luck, Andrew," replied the boy. "I've no traps set. I won't see the forest for many a long day again."

"Haud your tongue, man!" cried Andrew, looking very serious and pretending to be angry. "Haud your tongue. Are ye takin' leave o' your reason? What have ye in that bag? Why are ye no dressed in the kilt, but in your Sunday braws?"

Then Harry told him all--told him of the determination he had for many a day to go to sea, and of the conversation he had overheard on the previous evening.

Andrew used all the arguments he could think of or muster to dissuade him from his purpose, and enlarged upon the many dangers to be encountered on the stormy main, as he called it, but all to no purpose.

"Mind ye," said Andrew, "I've been to sea myself, and know something about it."

Honest, innocent Andrew, all the experience he had of the stormy main was what he had gained in a six hours' voyage betwixt Granton and Aberdeen.

But when Andrew found that nothing which he could adduce made the slightest impression on his young friend, he pulled out his snuff-horn, took two enormously large pinches, and sat down in silence to look at Harry.

The boy pulled out a letter from his breast-pocket.

"This is for my dear mother," he said. "Give it to her to-day. Tell her how sorry I was to go away. Tell her--tell her--."

Here the boy fairly broke down, and sobbed as if his heart would break.

My hero crying? Yes, I do not feel shame for him either. The soldier or sailor, ere journeying far away to foreign lands, is none the less brave if he does pause on the brow of the hill, and, looking back to his little cottage in the glen, drop a tear.

Do you remember the words of the beautiful song--

"Mid pleasures and palaces tho' we may roam, Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home; A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there, Which, seek thro' the world, is ne'er met elsewhere.

"An exile from home, splendour dazzles in vain, Oh! give me my lowly thatched cottage again!