Puck — September 24, 1879 — page 11: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

PUCK. 459 ARCHIE GASCOYNE A ROMANCE OF SKYE. WRITTEN EXPRESSLY FOR PUCK, BY JOHN FRASER, Aurior oF “Effie: a Tale of Two Worlds;” “Essays from the Westminster;” «Duncan Fenwick'’s Daughter; ” «Fair Fragoletta;” “Scottish Chapbooks;” ‘A Dream of a Life;"” . «+ Legends of Lome; * Lone Glengartney,”” ete., etc., etc. CHAPTER XXIV, JFEARIED and worn out as he was by NM! the conflicting passions and physical fa- tigue of the last twelve hours, it was long before Archie went to sleep, and when at last he did so, his slumbers were broken and disturbed. All sorts of hideous dreams flashed through his brain, and it was as well for him that no one was present to hear his feverish ut- terances and cries. All that morning he tossed to and fro on the hard, narrow sofa, in the small, stuffy, confined little cabin, on which he had thrown himself, all dressed as he was; and when he did waken it was with a great cry, and a terrible throb- bing at the heart. “Great God!” and as the words broke from his lips large beads of sweat stood upon his brow, and he staggered to his feet and stared around him with a wild, bewildered glance, “where am 1?” Then, as his eyes took in the meagre details of the little cabin; the small, bare coarse wood- en table; the low ceiling; the sloping wooden sides; the two small, circular glass windows; and his ear caught the swish and swirl of the water, and the monotonous, regular thud, thud of the engine, and he felt the vibration caused by the propeller, he remembered where he was, and with a great sign of relief sank back upon the sofa and cried: “Thank God! thank God!” For he had dreamed,—a terrible dream; and it was some minutes before he could bring him- self to realise exactly where he was, and that it was not all a horrible reality. And the dream was this: Tue Dream. It was a quiet stream in his own native coun- ty—in one of the loveliest spots in all that lovely North, where painters have loved to lin- ger from time immemorial, and whose charms great poets have consecrated in immortal song. Lovely beyond doubt it was, with that quiet, soul-satisfying loveliness which is only to be found in perfection in old England, and that only in certain conditions of weather and at- mosphere, and at certain seasons of the year, Through great, low-lying fields of golden grain, over which the evening breezes swept with impetuous, light feet, blending the radiant yellow of the corn and the bright, blood-red of the poppies in a glorious arabesque of gold and green and scarlet: past dark green woods and gently rising knolls of grassy green: away round moss-lichened boulders, topped by dark green firs, through which gleamed the red berry of the rowan: circling round towering crags, from whose frowning peaks ivy-mantled ruins of hoary castles stood out boldly against the glorious autumn sky, the river stole; and as the dreamer lazily guided the easy tiller and gently bellying sail, a great happiness filled his soul, and he felt that this in very deed was Paradise. For, with her head upon his breast, and her fair, pure face looking lovingly up into his nestled the woman of his love. And never had she looked more beautiful. The dying ra- diance of the setting sun was flushing the west- ern horizon with great streaks and masses of urple and azure and gold, and the reflection falling on her face lit it up with a soft, radiant glory. “And you really love me, darling? Really ?” he was saying, as he gazed down upon her with eyes of unutterable love, “Oh, Archie, can you doubt it?” she mur- mured, as she pressed his arm gently, tenderly. “ Repeat it just once more then; only once more, Only say once more, “I love you—-I love you.” “T love you—I love you,” she murmured once more, as a sweet flush dyed her cheek, and a soft light looked from her eye, and she hid her face in his breast. And he stooped to raise her head and kiss her. And as he did so an icy shiver passed through him and chilled him to the heart, And he gently raised the head, and lo! instead of the beautiful fair face of the woman he loved, there grinned at him out of socketless eyes a ghastly skeleton. With a shriek he tried to throw it off, and somehow as he tried it melted into thin air, and passed away. And lo! a mighty wind came out of the sky and beat the river into flakes of foam, and the boat crumbled from beneath and around him, and a great darkness fell upon the land, and he found himself alone —panting, struggling, swimming in a sea of BLOOD. For the river banks had disappeared, and he was floating in a seemingly boundless ocean of blood; only that, far off to the west, there loomed up a dark, gray bank as of cloud. It was the shore of some unknown continent, and on it stood the woman whom he loved, and, great though the distance was, he could see her features as distinctly as if he were holding her in his arms. And a sweet smile irradiated her face, and a great love shone from her eyes, and circling her proud, small, beautiful head gleamed softly a misty radiance like unto the radiance that circles the temples of the blessed. And she smiled on him, and her lips moved as if they were uttering words of love, and she beckoned him to come to her. But the tide was strong against him; and the blood had afhorrible, deadly, sickening stench; and his limbs found a great difficulty in moving, just asif he were swimming ina sea of thick, liquid gum. But she beckoned him on, and after many hours,—which to him it seemed as so many ages —panting, struggling, faint and all but dead, he succeeded in reaching the shore. And she bent down, and holding out her two white hands, she caught his in hers, and helped him to his feet, and the glory that shone from her face seemed to pass into his very heart and suffuse it with warmth and life and love. And he clasped her in his arms in an ecstacy of emotion, and she hid her blushing face on his breast. And, as before, he gently stooped to kiss her, and raised her head, and lo! in- stead of the fair, sweet face, a ghastly skeleton grinned at him hideously out of its socketless eyeballs, in and out of which wriggled loath- some worms, With a cry of agony he tried to shake off the hideous shing; but he could not. The more he struggled the tighter and deadlier be- came the horrible embrace. And as he strug- gled, not only the ocean, but land, air and sky became a bloody red, and across the heaven an unseen hand wrote in gigantic letters of lurid flame: “THOU MURDERER!” ‘Then it was that, with a cry of agony, the dreamer awoke, and staggering to his feet, heaved a great sigh of relief to find that it was indeed a dream. * * * As Archie sat there still all trembling from his hideous nightmare, and overwhelmed and bewildered by a torrent of conflicting emotions, he heard a gentle scraping at the cabin door— a sound that seemed almost to have something of a pleading nature in it, as if the creator of it wanted, and yet was afraid, to attract the at- tention of the person inside, Simple and slight as the sound was, it startled Archie to his feet, so highly strung were his nerves; as the rustling of adead leaf is popu- larly supposed to terrify a murderer. He listened. The sound was repeated, fol- lowed by a low wail. His face lit up; a joyful surprise flashed into his eyes. “Tt is Schneider!” he cried, as he threw open the door, and sure enough it was Schnei- der—Schneider, his well-loved and faithful dog; a beautiful black and brown collie re- lieved with white; as true as steel; as brave as a lion; as wise as a man; and faithful unto the death, From earliest boyhood Schneider had been his constant companion and friend; his faithful follower; the partner of his schoolday joys and sorrows; the recipient of all his boyish con- fidences, For Schneider was wise beyond the average of even first-rate canine sagacity, and, as had been a thousand times observed, could do everything but speak. And even as to that, was there not speech in those beautiful gray eyes of hers, so changeful in their expression; now joyous as the eyes of a child, as it gambolled beside its master; then keen with the fierce, glad intensity of the chase as it hunted down the hares among the heather; and again full of a wonderfully touching, wist- ful pathos and sympathy when Archie was in trouble and grief? “It is Schneider!” he cried, as he hastened to open the door. Hardly had he turned the handle ere the faithful collie had bounded on him, frantic with joy, licking and kicking his feet, his body, his face. In the excitement of the terrible night that had just passed; in the confusion and hurry and darkness, Archie had forgotten his humble friend, but Schneider, more faithful, had in no ways forgotten him. Through the storm and the darkness she had followed the two horsemen all the way from Gleninver to Portree, and when unobserved had leaped on bbard the steamer and hid herself away behind a coil of ropes. For, not having been taken into his master’s confidence, and not having been asked to ac- company him, Schneider felt instinctively that she might be doing wrong. Hence the silence and stealthy secrecy of her movements; hence the reason why she slunk