CHAPTER XVII.
ON BOARD THE “CLORINDA.”
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The next day, at six o'clock in the morning, the Clorinda, a charming yawl of from forty-five to fifty tons burden, left the little harbour of Iona, and, under a light north-easterly breeze, tacking to starboard, gained the open sea.
The Clorinda carried on board Miss Campbell, her uncles, Oliver Sinclair, Dame Bess and Partridge; it is hardly necessary to say that the unlucky Aristobulus was not with them.
This arrangement had been made, and immediately put in execution, after the adventure of the previous evening.
On leaving the cathedral hill to return to the inn, Miss Campbell had said very abruptly,—
“Uncles, since Mr. Ursiclos intends to remain at Iona we will let him have the island to himself. Once at Oban and again here, it has been entirely his fault that we have not been able to make our observation; we will not stay a day longer where this tiresome man can annoy us with his clumsy pranks!”
To this proposal so frankly made, the brothers had nothing to object; besides, they also shared the general discontent, and anathematized Aristobulus Ursiclos. Decidedly the situation of the suitor of their choice was for ever compromised. Nothing could bring him again into Miss Campbell's good graces, so, from now and henceforth, they were obliged to relinquish a plan which could never be realized.
“After all,” as Sam observed aside to his brother, “promises imprudently made are not iron manacles!”
Which, in other words, means that one can never be bound by a rash oath, and Sib had given his complete approbation to this Scotch axiom.
Just as they were saying “good night” in the long room of the Duncan Arms, Miss Campbell said,—
“We shall start to-morrow; I will not stay here a day longer!”
“That is understood, my dear Helena,” said her uncle Sam; “but where shall we go?”
“Any place where we shall be certain of not meeting that Mr. Ursiclos! So no one must know that we are going to leave Iona nor where we are going.”
“Just so, my dear child,” replied Sib; “but how shall we get away, and where shall we go?”
“What!” exclaimed Miss Campbell, “is there no means of leaving this island at dawn? Is there not one inhabited or even uninhabited place along the Scotch coast, where we might make our observation in peace?”
Her uncles certainly could not have answered these two questions, asked in a tone which admitted of no misunderstanding or prevarication.
Fortunately Oliver Sinclair was at hand.
“Miss Campbell,” said he, “this is how everything can be arranged: there is an island or rather an islet near here which will be quite suitable for the observation, and at the same time we shall not risk being interfered with by any one.”
“Which is it?”
“It is Staffa, which you can see two miles to the north of this island.”
“Is there any place to lodge at, and any possibility of getting there?” asked Miss Campbell.
“Yes,” replied Oliver, “and very easily. I have seen a yacht lying in the harbour, which can be hired at any time, to go to the English Channel, the North Sea, or the Irish Channel. What is there to prevent us from chartering this yacht, and stocking it with provisions for a fortnight, since Staffa can offer nothing in that way, and starting to-morrow at break of day?”
“Mr. Sinclair,” replied Miss Campbell, “if we can secretly leave this island to-morrow, you may be sure I shall owe you a great debt of gratitude!”
“To-morrow before midday, provided we get a good breeze in the morning, we shall be at Staffa,” replied Oliver, “and except for visitors who stop for scarcely an hour twice a week, we shall have the island to ourselves.”
As usual the brothers at once summoned Dame Bess, who immediately appeared.
“We are going to leave here to-morrow!” said Sam.
“To-morrow at daybreak!” added Sib.
And thereupon, without further parley, Dame Bess and Partridge at once set to work to make their preparations for departure.
Meanwhile Oliver had gone down to the harbour, and was there making arrangements with John Olduck.
John Olduck was the skipper of the Clorinda, a true seaman, with his gold-laced cap and brass buttons on his blue suit. Directly the terms were arranged, he with his six men, at once set to work to get everything in sailing order; his crew were composed of some of those picked men who, by trade, are fishermen in the winter, and take service on board yachts in the summer; they make the best sailors in the world.
At six o'clock in the morning the new passengers went on board the Clorinda.
They had carried off all the provisions they could get, including fresh and preserved meat; besides the steward would always be able to take in a fresh stock from the steamers which run regularly between Oban and Staffa.
Thus, at daybreak. Miss Campbell had taken possession of a charming little boudoir at the stern of the yacht; her uncles had the comfortable berth in the “main cabin” beyond the saloon. Oliver Sinclair had a cabin near the companion-steps leading to the saloon, and Dame Bess and Partridge disposed of themselves, the one on the left, the other on the right of the captain's cabin. Towards the bows was the kitchen, and beyond that again the crew's quarters, provided with six hammocks. Nothing was wanting in this charming yawl, built by Ratsey of Cowes; with a fair sea and stiff breeze, she would have taken an honourable place in “The Royal Thames Yacht Club Regatta.”
Every one was delighted when the Clorinda at last left her moorings, and got under sail. She dipped gracefully to the breeze, without her white deck of Canadian pine being soiled by a particle of spray from the waves through which her slender bows were cutting.
The distance between Iona and Staffa is very short; with a favourable wind it can easily be done in twenty-five minutes by a yacht making her eight miles an hour. But just now the wind was dead ahead, though but a light breeze; besides this the tide was going down, so that they were obliged to tack several times before they could reach Staffa.
This mattered very little to Miss Campbell; the Clorinda had started, and that was the main thing.
An hour later Iona was lost to view in the morning haze, and with it the detested image of that bête-noir whose very name Helena would have liked to forget, as she frankly confessed to her uncles.
“Have I not some reason for it, Uncle Sam?”
“Every reason, my dear Helena.”
“And does Uncle Sib also approve?”
“Entirely.”
“Then,” added she, kissing them both, “you must confess it was a very foolish idea of yours to think of marrying me to such a man!”
And they both agreed that it was.
Altogether this was a charming trip, its only fault being that it was too short. And yet what was there to hinder them from prolonging it, and why not let the yawl carry them over the open Atlantic in search of the Green Ray? But no; it had been agreed that they should go to Staffa, and the skipper had made his arrangements to reach that celebrated isle directly the tide was favourable.
About eight o'clock, an early breakfast, composed of tea and sandwiches, was served in the saloon. The guests, in high good-humour, took their places at the table, without one regret for the good things of the Duncan Arms. Ungrateful creatures!
When Miss Campbell again came on deck, the yacht had tacked and changed her bearings. She was now making towards the fine lighthouse, built upon the rock of Skerryvore, which rises a hundred and fifty feet above the level of the sea. The breeze, having freshened, the Clorinda, with her great white sails spread, was struggling against the ebb-tide, but made very little progress towards Staffa.
Miss Campbell was reclining in the stern upon one of the thick canvas cushions used on board pleasure-boats. She thoroughly enjoyed the rapid motion of the yacht, so different from the jolting of a railway journey; it was like the speed of a skater, carried along on the surface of a frozen lake. Nothing could have been more graceful than the Clorinda as she lightly dipped her head in the sparkling waves, sometimes seeming to float in the air like an immense bird upheld by its powerful wings.
This sea, covered to the north and south by the Hebrides, and sheltered by the coast on the east, is like an inland basin or lake.
The yacht made an oblique run for Staffa, a great, solitary rock lying off Mull, only a hundred feet above the level of the sea. One might almost imagine that it moved, showing sometimes its basaltic cliffs to the west, and sometimes the rugged pile of rocks on its eastern coast. By an optical illusion it seemed to turn upon its base, at the caprice of the angles under which the Clorinda approached or turned from it
Meanwhile, owing to the tide and wind, the yacht made little progress; when she veered towards the west, beyond the extreme point of Mull, she met with a heavy sea against which she gallantly held her own, then, tacking, she found herself gently rocked in quiet waters.
Towards eleven o'clock the Clorinda had gone far enough north to enable her to run straight for Staffa; sail was taken in, and the captain made ready for mooring.
There is no harbour at Staffa, but it is easily approached under any wind on its eastern side, among the rocks capriciously scattered by some convulsion of a geological period. At the same time, in very bad weather, the place is not approachable by craft above a certain tonnage.
The Clorinda was able to go alongside these black basaltic rocks. She veered round skilfully, leaving on one side the rock of Bouchaillie with its prismatic sides left bare by the low tide, and on the other, that causeway running along the coast to the left. This is the best anchorage in the island, and the place where the boats which bring tourists to the island call for them again, after their excursion over the hills of Staffa.
The Clorinda penetrated a little creek almost to the entrance of Clam-shell Cave, where her sails were taken in and the anchor dropped.
A moment later, Miss Campbell and her companions disembarked, and ascended the steps cut in the rock to the left of the grotto. A wooden staircase with a handrail led up the cliff, and this they took to reach the upper plateau.
At last they were at Staffa, and as much out of the civilized world as if a storm had cast them on a desert island in the Pacific.