Read Online A Stranger Came Ashore by Mollie Hunter - Free Book Online
Authors: Mollie Hunter
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opinion that any strangeness about Finn Learson was due to his being a foreigner?
Only Robbie thought differently, and he was utterly dismayed by the idea that Elspeth might even consider marrying Finn Learson. But supposing she did, he argued to himself, that would make nonsense of the words,
You will be rich when you wed
; for how could Elspeth be rich if she married Finn Learson, any more than she would be if she married Nicol?
The weeks after harvest time slid by with Robbie still uneasily pondering this; and meanwhile, Peter and Janet agreed that they were still glad to see Finn Learson staying on with them. He was a great help on the croft, after all, and he was company for Peter now that Old Da was dead and Nicol had turned so awkward over this courtship business. Moreover – as they were both fond of saying –the favours were far from being all on their side, considering what they owed him over the matter of the Press Gang.
Indeed, it seemed to Robbie, things had now got to the stage where Finn Learson could do no wrong in his parents’ eyes; and since the same Robbie had a great respect for his parents, he began at last to wonder if his own thoughts about Finn Learson might perhaps be a bit on the foolish side.
After all, as he had to admit to himself, he had no really good grounds for these thoughts – just his own imagination, in fact, and the last rambling words of a sick old man. Besides which, he was finding Finn Learson a much more talkative man now that Old Da was dead, and quite willing to speak in a friendly way of the roving life he had led.
“Once, on the shores of Greenland,” he told Robbie, “a man came at me with a knife to kill me – see, I bear the mark of his knife to this very day, in this long white scar of the healed wound in my shoulder …”
Then on he went, spinning many another tale of strange adventures in far countries. And never once did Robbie dream that all this friendliness might be just a device for drawing him into the same snare of charm that had already begun to hold Elspeth!
There was something else, too, which lulled Robbie’s fears at that time and drove other forms of imagining from his mind, for it was in the slack season after harvest each year that he went to school. And that particular year, he had begun to study navigation.
Now this was a subject which could take a Shetland boy far – perhaps even as far as commanding his own whaling ship – and Robbie thought it would be a grand thing to sail north, and ever northwards, in pursuit of the great whale. So it happened that he began to think ever less about Finn Learson; and it was with grand dreams of whaling ships in his head that he set off each day for the schoolhouse on the far side of the hill to study with the rest of the boys in Black Ness.
This left him with only weekends for the other great interest which always occupied him at that time of the year, and which was therefore another thing that took his mind off Finn Learson; for it was then – from about the middle of September to the end of October – that all the selkie pups were born.
Robbie knew every place where these were to be found, of course, from all the previous years he had gone with Old Da to visit them. And so, every Saturday he could persuade his father to let him have the boat, he was away by himself to the cliffs rising steeply from the west side of the voe.
This was where the sea had made deep cuts in the rock face – the kind of cut with a name that is sounded “yoe,” although it is spelt “geo.” This was where the great, dark-grey bull seals came ashore to fight for mastery of the shingle beach at the inner end of each geo. This was where the sleek and shining cow seals came ashore also, to have their pups. And this was where Robbie hoped one day to realise his great longing to pick up one of these pups so that he could learn what a seal felt like.
Not that he would take any risks in that, he assured himself when he
Only Robbie thought differently, and he was utterly dismayed by the idea that Elspeth might even consider marrying Finn Learson. But supposing she did, he argued to himself, that would make nonsense of the words,
You will be rich when you wed
; for how could Elspeth be rich if she married Finn Learson, any more than she would be if she married Nicol?
The weeks after harvest time slid by with Robbie still uneasily pondering this; and meanwhile, Peter and Janet agreed that they were still glad to see Finn Learson staying on with them. He was a great help on the croft, after all, and he was company for Peter now that Old Da was dead and Nicol had turned so awkward over this courtship business. Moreover – as they were both fond of saying –the favours were far from being all on their side, considering what they owed him over the matter of the Press Gang.
Indeed, it seemed to Robbie, things had now got to the stage where Finn Learson could do no wrong in his parents’ eyes; and since the same Robbie had a great respect for his parents, he began at last to wonder if his own thoughts about Finn Learson might perhaps be a bit on the foolish side.
After all, as he had to admit to himself, he had no really good grounds for these thoughts – just his own imagination, in fact, and the last rambling words of a sick old man. Besides which, he was finding Finn Learson a much more talkative man now that Old Da was dead, and quite willing to speak in a friendly way of the roving life he had led.
“Once, on the shores of Greenland,” he told Robbie, “a man came at me with a knife to kill me – see, I bear the mark of his knife to this very day, in this long white scar of the healed wound in my shoulder …”
Then on he went, spinning many another tale of strange adventures in far countries. And never once did Robbie dream that all this friendliness might be just a device for drawing him into the same snare of charm that had already begun to hold Elspeth!
There was something else, too, which lulled Robbie’s fears at that time and drove other forms of imagining from his mind, for it was in the slack season after harvest each year that he went to school. And that particular year, he had begun to study navigation.
Now this was a subject which could take a Shetland boy far – perhaps even as far as commanding his own whaling ship – and Robbie thought it would be a grand thing to sail north, and ever northwards, in pursuit of the great whale. So it happened that he began to think ever less about Finn Learson; and it was with grand dreams of whaling ships in his head that he set off each day for the schoolhouse on the far side of the hill to study with the rest of the boys in Black Ness.
This left him with only weekends for the other great interest which always occupied him at that time of the year, and which was therefore another thing that took his mind off Finn Learson; for it was then – from about the middle of September to the end of October – that all the selkie pups were born.
Robbie knew every place where these were to be found, of course, from all the previous years he had gone with Old Da to visit them. And so, every Saturday he could persuade his father to let him have the boat, he was away by himself to the cliffs rising steeply from the west side of the voe.
This was where the sea had made deep cuts in the rock face – the kind of cut with a name that is sounded “yoe,” although it is spelt “geo.” This was where the great, dark-grey bull seals came ashore to fight for mastery of the shingle beach at the inner end of each geo. This was where the sleek and shining cow seals came ashore also, to have their pups. And this was where Robbie hoped one day to realise his great longing to pick up one of these pups so that he could learn what a seal felt like.
Not that he would take any risks in that, he assured himself when he
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