THE KEEPER OF CONAN SKERRY

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 205, 29 August 1936, Page 3 (Supplement)

THE KEEPER OF CONAN SKERRY

By RUTH PARK.

WHEN Meggie had landed on the island she rather wished she

hadn't. It was so lonely, with the tussocks blowing up the slope and the grey sea tossing endlessly along the shingle. She pulled the boat up out of reach of the waves and looked around. The cold wind tugged at her skirt. Meggie shivered. She. turned and looked back at the mainland, at the village tucked under the dark swell of the heather hills beyond. It suddenly seemed infin itely homely and desirable.

The spirit of youthful bravado that had prompted her to land upon the desolate skerry had already evaporated. Meggie, looking again at the windswept slopes and the drear crest of the hill, felt a faint mis giving. They said the island wis haunted, that not even a sea bird would land there. It had been deserted for so many hundreds of years that its loneliness had become a byword in those fishing villages along the western coast.

Meggie thought, "I'll run to the top of the hill and have a look at the island from therej" and barefooted and sure as a goat she t sppJ up through the shingle and clumps of rough grass until she stood panting upon the brow of the hill. Conin Skerry looked as though it merited its reputation, so bleak, so solitary was it, thrusting its grey mass from the turbulent sea as thought it were the peak of a mountain; sheer it was on two sides, with straight cliffs descending to a narrow beach, and on the third side, on which Meggie had landed, no vegetation save that bf -the knife-edged grass and a email grove of trees, dwarfed and twisted by the everlasting fury of the win!. Meggie felt a.thrill of triumph as she stood there on the crest, knowing that she was probably the first person to stand in that spot for half a century. .It was strange how tha dour, practical Scottish folk had woven such a maze of superstition and imagination about the skerry, she thought. They had turned the prosaic little islet into something uncanny, something not quite natural, like one of the twisted trees

in the grove,

As the thought flashed through her mind, Meggie's eyes focussed on the trees. Horrible, leafless, hunchbacked things they were, and one in particular, standing in the shadow of the others, was a black caricature of a man. Meggie's eyes strove to pierce the huddle of branches. The

tree was remarkably like a" human form, leaning there in the shadow. She could almost have sworn that it moved. Her heart jumped. It had moved! Meggie gave a cry of terror. . She clasped her hands tightly and stood poised, ready to flee. The black boughs shuddered, and something—someone emerged; Meggia, forgetting her terror, stared in blank astonishment. It was a man, a tail man, and in that clear thin atmosphere his hair shone as yellow as gold. Unconsciously Meggie touched her -own black locks. He stood there against the tangled trees, not twenty yards away from her, and, although she rubbed her eyes fiercely, he did not disappear.

' Little girl," he said, "come here," and without any-hesitation, Meggie went slowly over the rough ground towards him, wondering at herself as she did so. For some odd reason she felt entirely unafraid, yet her mind was quick and athrill, as though shf were on the verge of some great and splendid adventure.

She twisted her hands in her plaid skirt, and looked wide-eyed at him. It was so strange, not only the fact of his being on ■ this desolate skerry, but his appearance also, utterly unlike anything she : had ever 'seen before. There was something foreign in his face, witK its quick, comradely smile, and the startlingly blue eyes, and over all the pale, brilliant hair. He was wearing some queer kind' of tunic that she cou'.i not see clearly, because a cloak of thick woollen stuff fell in heavy fold-! from his shoulders to Jiis feet —faded and stained it was, and clipped at hi 3 throat with an intricately-worked clasp of dull gold. ..

Meggie looked and looked, then suddenly, as though a spell had been lifted from her, the presence of the tall map. upon lonely Conan Skerry, his foreign appearance, seemed entirely natural. It was as though she had known him all her life. There was rio strangeness in him at all.

He flashed that quick smile at her. 'What are you doing on this bleak island?" he asked. * '

"I came merely to prove to myself that I was not afraid of it," confessed Meggie.

"And you are not afraid ?"

"No," said Meggie, then, "it was only because they said it was haunted." She looked again, at her surroundings. The shore no longer seemed so bleak or dreary, the air was warmer—Meggie sensed some intangible change in the atmosphere, but could not determine what. She wrinkled her brows.

"I wonder why the skerry is supposed to be haunted?" she said. "I think it was because of Olaf," he answered slowly.

She looked at him questioningly,

"Oh, it is only a legend," hi? smiled, "but it dates back to the time that the Norsemen were harrying the coasts of Scotland, and Jarl Einar left his son Olaf to die of starvation upon this lonely skerry."

"But why, why, should anyone be so cruel?" cried Meggie.

His eyes kindled. "Oh, he was a lion, the Jarl, with his wild yellow hair and fierce eyes, and the horned helmet of the Viking oh his head! A strong man, whose only law was his will, and whose authority lay in his cruel battle-axe!"..

"But why shoiild he maroon hi son?" burst-out Meggie again.

"Oh," he said''with'V'fi&sfr of a. smile, "Olaf was insubordinate. He wanted to marry a rival jarl's daughter, perhaps—or. perhaps he didn't. It doesn't matter now. Anyway, in' a mad fit of rage the old Norseman wounded him, and cast him ashore,9ll Conan Skerry, with the curse tha: he might stop there until a thousand years was gone. And then he rowed avvay- to the north and never returned."

"And Olaf?" asked Meggie,

"From their boats the villagers saw him, but with the terror of the Vikings still upon them, they refused to go near, even to ?help a dying man. And so—he died." '

"I'm sorry," said Meggie-simply,

Once again the man bent on her that quick smile. "And so the legend grew that the Viking's spirit haunted Conan Skerry, and the island was left to its desolation and dreariness."

Meggie looked up with a start, for a moment she had been back in those far years of barbarism and savagery. She gave a glance at the sky. The dim sun was sinking low.

"I must go," she said, "they will be wondering where I am."

Together they went down to the little boat. The sea came in white, frosty lines upon the beach. Meggie shivered.

"You are cold," said the man suddenly, and with one swift movement he had unclasped the cloak from his "shoulders and wrapped it around her.. It 'was much too "big, but Meggie put it over her head, shawlwise, and huddled it warmly about her shoulders. Her quaint , face peeped out gravely from its shadow.

"Thank you," she said, but he only smiled. :

Meggie had taken several strokes away from tlie skerry when she suddenly remembered.

"How long is it since Olaf died here?" she shouted.

Over the splash of. the oars and the water came the. reply. "A thousand years ago, to-day." ..T

Meggie pulled steadily away, her eyes fixed upon the, diminishing blur that, was Conan Skerry. When she reached the mainland, she "dragged the boat upon the sand, and made her way up to the village, unconscious of the eyes upon her. At the

corner she; was suddenly surrounded by a crowd. Meggie raised her head abstractedly to meet gaping eyes and. open mouths.

"Girl," said an> awed voice, "have you been on the haunted skerry ?"

"Why, yes," said Meggie somewhat defiantly, "and why should I not land there?"

"Heaven above us-" said another. "What has the lass about her shoulders ?"

Meggie grasped the cloak and drew it defensively around her.

"Where did you get it V" said a voice in her ear.

"Oh, what does it matter?" cried Meggie. provoked. "But if you must know—"

"Well?" came the clamour, the ring of curious faces pressing closer. Meggie could find no answer. She looked appealingly around her. hut before she could frame a sentence, someone came pushing through the crowd. It was Donald, the innkeeper, and the self-appointed historian of the village. His weak eyes peered at Meggie.

"Girl," he said in a trernbling voice, "where did you get that cloak?" And reached out a palsied hand, towards it.

"I know it is the one,", cried a woman shrilly, before Meggie had a chance to answer. "My father told me exactly what it was like, and he was there when they found him."

"Found what?" asked Meggie, in spite of herself.

The old man came closer. "Lassie.'* he said impressively, "fifty years ago and more, something wae found oil Conan Skerry, the bones of .one' of the accursed foreigners that pirated these shores hundreds of years agone. And the bones were wrapped in a cloak exactly like the one you're, wear-. ing!" ' Meggie found it difficult to speak. Once again her heart was athrill. as though she were on the threshold of a great adventure.

"What," she said haltingly, "did you do with the—the—"

"We weren't having no" truck with them," eaid Donald, thrusting his wrinkled face * close, " "because they were the bones of Norsemen who haunts that skerry, so we buried them, cloak and all! Fifty year ago that were!" ;

"Where did you get it?" asked the first insistent voice again.

"From the man with the yellow hair," she said slowly.

A horrified murmur ran through the crowd, and someone gave a little scream. There ,was a perceptible falling back of the circle about her.

Meggie looked at them and pulled the garment cloeer around her. The touch- of the rough fabric against her clieek. gave her an odd feeling of courage. Something had happened which she could not understand, but wfi'ich was somehow beautiful. She felt utterly tranquil, and unafraid.

"It was Olaf." she said, "and he was very kind."