Big Game - A Story for Girls

Margot grunted unsympathetically. She was out of breath with scrambling

up the hillside, a trifle out of temper also, and consequently not in

the mood to enthuse over artistic contrasts. She did not speak again

until the summit was reached, and she threw herself on the ground to

rest, and wait the arrival of the Chieftain. His gasps and grunts could

already be heard in the distance, for, notwithstanding his various

handicaps, he was surprisingly nimble, and in a few moments a round

scarlet face hove into sight, and a round grey body rolled over on the

ground by her side.

"Piff! piff! whew-w! Don't look at me, please--I don't like--being

stared at by ladies--when my--complexion is flushed!" he gasped

brokenly, mopping his face with a large silk handkerchief. "Every

time--I--come up here--I vow I'll--never come again; but when I'm once

up, I--never want to go down!"

He flourished his handkerchief to the left, pointing out the wide

moorland, beautiful in colouring with its bright rank greens, and the

bloomy purple of heather undulating gently up and down like the waves of

an inland sea.

The pure rarefied air fanned the heated faces of the climbers, and with

every moment seemed to instil fresh life and vigour. It was easy to

believe that, once started, one would wander on and on over this

wonderful moorland, feeling no fatigue, possessed with the desire to go

farther and farther, to see what surprise lay beyond the next hillock.

After all, it was Mr Elgood who made the first start. One moment he

lay still, puffing and blowing, bemoaning past youth, and bewailing loss

of strength; the next, like an indiarubber ball, he had bounced to his

feet, and was strutting forward, waving his short arms in the air, the

white silk handkerchief streaming behind him like a flag.

"Allons, mes enfants! No lolling allowed on the moors. Keep your eye

on that green peak to the right, and make for it as straight as a die.

A few hundred yards away is a cottage where, if we are very polite and

ask prettily, the guid-wife will give us a cup of buttermilk, the Gaelic

substitute for afternoon tea. In a certain spot, which shall be

nameless, I should as soon think of drinking poison in glassfuls, but

after a stretch on the moors it tastes like nectar! Take my word for

it, and try!"

That was the first walk which Ron and Margot had ever taken over a

Scotch moor, and to the last day of their lives they remembered it with

joy. The air went to their heads so that they grew "fey," and sang, and

laughed, and teased each other like a couple of merry-hearted children,

while the Chieftain was the biggest child of the three.

At times he declared that he was tired out and must turn back, but

hardly were the words out of his mouth, than, lo, he was dancing an

impromptu hornpipe with astonishing nimbleness and dexterity! He took a

lively interest in all that his companions did and said, and did not

hesitate to put question after question in order to arrive at a fuller

understanding of any case in point; but London, and all that took place

in London, remained a forbidden topic. He was the Elgood of Elgood, and

they were "his bonnie men," and life outside the Highlands had ceased to

exist.