“I don’t like to go away from Borva,” said Lavender in a low voice to Sheila, “but I might have been leaving the island with greater regret, for, you know, I expect to be back soon.”

“We shall always be glad to see you,” said the girl; and although he would rather have had her say “I” than “we,” there was something in the tone of her voice that contented him.

At Garra-na-hina Mackenzie pointed out with a great interest to Lavender a tall man who was going down through some meadows to the Amhuinn Dhubh, “the Black River.”  He had a long rod over his shoulder, and behind him, at some distance, followed a shorter man, who carried a gaff and landing-net.  Mackenzie anxiously explained to Lavender that the tall figure was that of an Englishman.  Lavender accepted the statement.  But would he not go down to the river and make his acquaintance?  Lavender could not understand why he should be expected to take so great an interest in an ordinary English sportsman.

“Ferry well,” said Mackenzie, a trifle disappointed, “but you would find several of the English in the Lewis if you wass living here.”

These last two days in Stornoway were very pleasant.  On their previous visit to the town Mackenzie had given up much of his time to business affairs, and was a good deal away from his guests, but now he devoted himself to making them particularly comfortable in the place and amusing them in every possible way.  He introduced Lavender, in especial, to all his friends there, and was most anxious to impress on the young man that life in Stornoway was, on the whole, rather a brilliant affair.  Then was there a finer point from which you could start at will for Inverness, Oban and such great centres of civilization?  Very soon there would even be a telegraphic cable laid to the mainland.  Was Mr. Lavender aware that frequently you could see the Sutherlandshire hills from this very town of Stornoway?

There Sheila laughed, and Lavender, who kept watching her face always to read all her fancies and sentiments and wishes in the shifting lights of it, immediately demanded an explanation.

“It is no good thing,” said Sheila, “to see the Sutherland hills often, for when you see them it means to rain.”

But Lavender had not been taught to fear the rain of the Western Isles.  The very weather seemed to have conspired with Mackenzie to charm the young man with the island.  At this moment, for example, they were driving away from Stornoway along the side of the great bay that stretches northward until it finds its furthest promontory in Tiumpan Head.  What magnificence of color shone all around them in the hot sunlight!  Where the ruffled blue sea came near the long sweep of yellow sand it grew to be a bright, transparent green.  The splendid curve of the bay showed a gleaming line of white where the waves broke in masses of hissing foam; and beyond that curve again long promontories of dark red conglomerate