Jennie About to Be (53 page)

Suddenly Nancy seized him by both shoulders and gave him a great loud kiss. “You take care of 'er and yourself, you 'ear me?” Her little eyes were wet. She hugged Jennie. “When I see the what's-'er-name back 'ere, I'll know
she
reached America anyway.”

“I'll get word to you, Nancy, I promise,” Jennie said. “You'll mail my letter, won't you?”

“It will go out on the coach tomorrow.”

She wouldn't watch them out the door, but Angus did, insisting on shaking their hands and talking all the time in Gaelic. Alick smiled and slapped him lightly on the arm. When they had left him behind, Jennie said, “What was all that about?”

“He is going to America; he swears it on his mother's grave.”

The sunshine of a cloudless evening flooded Loch Linnhe with a hot topaz light. They had to wait on the shore for a place in the ship's boats, and this was a fresh torture. The one advantage was the great crowd made up of those who were actually going, those who always gathered to see off a shipload of emigrants, and those who were living precariously from hand to mouth while waiting for a chance to go. There was a great deal of weeping, both quiet and stormy, but at least no families were being wrenched apart; the group for
Paul Revere
was leaving no one behind.

Jennie saw two women farther along than Elspeth, and as many elderly people as there were children. The majority of the couples were sturdily in their prime, and there was a good sprinkling of young men who evidently preferred emigration to the Army. Now, with the Great Sheep coming, too many soldiers would return from the war to find their homes burned like those at Kilallan, and their families scattered, if not dead. This way a man and his wife and children would all live or die together.

She was especially moved by the very youthful couples; she guessed that many a marriage had been arranged to take in the lads over sixteen, and some of them must have just reached that age, they were so downy. These youngsters and the children weren't weeping; they were as touchingly eager and innocent in their wide-eyed view of the world as any young animals.

She was so taken with watching and listening that her and Alick's turn came as a surprise, and for that little while she had actually forgotten to be afraid.

They were the last to leave the boat and climb the ladder. She had wondered why the minister hadn't been on the shore to be a comforting shepherd to his flock, but she found him here, a beaming little wisp of a man, standing at the head of the ladder beside a ship's officer with a passenger list. He called each arrival by name and shook hands, then pointed out the name on the officer's list so he could tick it off. The minister might not speak English, but that wasn't necessary here. He gave Jennie an especially cordial greeting.

“Alexander Glenroy?” the officer said. “Yes, I remember. We met this morning.” He was young and had hard blue eyes in a tanned face with a long, sharp jaw. “And wife, Jean?”

“Yes, I am Jean,” Jennie said, holding Alick's arm.

“Thank God for English speakers!” the officer exclaimed. “The old man will include you every night in his prayers.” His grin took years off him. “The General will appreciate you, too, I reckon. Been a good many years since he spoke this whatever you call it.”

“Gaelic,” said Jennie. “It's the speech of the Gaels.”
I am talking with an American
, she thought in awe.

“It's new to me. This is my first landing in Scotland.”

A crewman came and said a few cryptic words to him, and pointed. A small boat rowed by one man, but with three others aboard, was approaching the ladder.

“Here they come looking for stowaways again!” the mate exclaimed in annoyance. “Excuse me, ma'am.” He touched his cap. The minister, not understanding but alarmed by the tone, looked worriedly from one to the other.

Alick pulled Jennie away from the ladder but stopped short of the crowded bow deck. The minister followed them, questioning Alick in Gaelic. He got a terse answer, but apparently it relieved him; he and his congregation had nothing to do with stowaways.

The three men came nimbly up the ladder. No one was in a uniform, and the Highland voices were mild, but officialdom was an all but visible aura.

“We will just be looking for stowaways, you understand.”

“There are no stowaways aboard this vessel, sir.” The mate was civil. “You may inspect the passenger list. Everyone is accounted for; there are a few more to come aboard, and they are all listed here.” He held out the list, and one man took it. The other was smilingly insistent; how could one be sure there were no stowaways? A man could have been smuggled aboard in a chest, for instance.

“We have no stowaways,” the mate repeated.

“We will be seeing your captain, if you please.”

Narrow-eyed, the mate beckoned to the crewman, who led the three off past Jennie and Alick. The mate looked over at Jennie and humorously shook his head, and she forced a smile. The minister went back to the ladder to welcome the next boatload of emigrants, and Jennie and Alick walked slowly forward until they could find a clear place at the rail in the bows. There was so much confusion around them that they could have spoken to each other without being overheard, but neither could find a word. Sweat ran down Jennie's back, and Alick's face was bedewed with it.

They were not stowaways, they had paid, but they were still fugitives, and who knew what the port officials might be discussing with the captain?

In a very short while the officials returned, bade the mate a courteous farewell, and went down the ladder to their boat. Obviously they had not been allowed to search the ship, but they were not greatly disturbed.

The last emigrants came aboard, the ship's boats were taken in, and the square sails were unfurled. Jennie and Alick stood transfixed, watching the men raising the anchor; an almost stunned silence settled briefly over the crowd as it realized the ship was moving. Shouts and cheers sounded over the water from the watchers onshore, and were raggedly returned from the brig; everyone crowded to that side to wave or to weep, or to gaze in a granite silence like Alick.

Then through all the bustle attending a ship's departure, there came the first long, piercing, warning wail of the pipes, and the Lament began. Jennie's scalp tightened; the gooseflesh rose on her arms under her clothes. The piper was aft, unseen by her, but she didn't need to see; she was
hearing
it, the anguished notes of a wild grief and a heartbroken promise;
We shall return no more
.

She could hardly see the wet faces and streaming eyes around her. To keep her own from overflowing, she looked up at the American ensign fluttering from the masthead, above the sails filling with red-gold light as well as wind. The slow measures of the farewell drove into her heart, but they were not killing blows; not for her.

She took Alick's hand and warmed it in both hers. “I promised you a ship,” she said, “and this is it. Now I promise you we are not going to drown. I will see you safe in America, with your own land under your feet.”

He didn't speak, but he didn't turn his face away. Taking her hand, he put it through his arm, and together they walked away from the crowd to the deserted starboard rail. In this hour of heartbreak and weeping all around her, with the pipers crying
We shal return no more
, she looked up at him and she realized that this was a man she could trust.

Silent together, they watched the Ardgour hills darken against the western sky as
Paul Revere
moved down Loch Linnhe toward the Firth of Lorne and the Sound of Mull, thence to stand out to the open sea.

The story of Jennie and Alick continues
in
The World of Jennie
G.

ELISABETH OGILVIE grew up in Massachusetts but has lived in Maine since 1944. Thanks to her perennially successful writing career, she has been able to live and work on Gay's Island for much of that time. Many of her novels are set on the Maine coast, including
High Tide at Noon
and subsequent novels in the multi-generational Bennett Island series.

Scotland is “the place I love best next to Maine,” Miss Ogilvie says, and her Jennie Trilogy spans both of these austerely beautiful lands, as Jennie's fortunes bring her first to the Scottish Highlands then to the coast of Maine.

Woman's Day, Redbook
, and
Good Housekeeping
have all published Miss Ogilvie's work, and her novel
Storm Tide
won the New England Women's Press Association award in 1947. After more than forty books, she says, she can still do some writing “for fun.”