CHAPTER XXII.

“LIKE HADRIANUS AND AUGUSTUS.”

The island of Borva lay warm and green and bright under a blue sky; there were no white curls of foam on Loch Roag, but only the long Atlantic swell coming in to fall on the white beach; away over there in the south the fine grays and purples of the giant Suainabhal shone in the sunlight amid the clear air; and the beautiful sea-pyots flew about the rocks, their screaming being the only sound audible in the stillness.  The King of Borva was down by the shore, seated on a stool, and engaged in the idyllic operation of painting a boat which had been hauled up on the sand.  It was the Maighdean-mhara.  He would let no one else on the island touch Sheila’s boat.  Duncan, it is true, was permitted to keep her masts and sails and seats sound and white, but as for the decorative painting of the small craft—­including a little bit of amateur gilding—­that was the exclusive right of Mr. Mackenzie himself.  For of course, the old man said; to himself, Sheila was coming back to Borva one these days, and she would be proud to find her own boat bright and sound.  If she and her husband should resolve to spend half the year in Stornoway, would not the small craft be of use to her there? and sure he was that a prettier little vessel never entered Stornoway Bay.  Mr. Mackenzie was at this moment engaged in putting a thin line of green round the white bulwarks that might have been distinguished across Loch Roag, so keen and pure was the color.

A much heavier boat, broad-beamed, red-hulled and brown-sailed, was slowly coming round the point at this moment.  Mr. Mackenzie raised his eyes from his work, and knew that Duncan was coming back from Callernish.  Some few minutes thereafter the boat was run in to her moorings, and Duncan came along the beach with a parcel in his hand.  “Here wass your letters, sir,” he said.  “And there iss one of them will be from Miss Sheila, if I wass make no mistake.”

He remained there.  Duncan generally knew pretty well when a letter from Sheila was among the documents he had to deliver, and on such an occasion he invariably lingered about to hear the news, which was immediately spread abroad throughout the island.  The old King of Borva was not a garrulous man, but he was glad that the people about him should know that his Sheila had become a fine lady in the South, and saw fine things and went among fine people.  Perhaps this notion of his was a sort of apology to them—­perhaps it was an apology to himself—­for his having let her go away from the island; but at all events the simple folks about Borva knew that Miss Sheila, as they still invariably called her, lived in the same town as the queen herself, and saw many lords and ladies, and was present at great festivities, as became Mr. Mackenzie’s only daughter.  And naturally these rumors and stories were exaggerated by the kindly interest and affection of the people