The Green Ray/Chapter XII

CHAPTER XII. NEW PLANS.
return to Oban was hardly as pleasant as the drive to Seil had been; they had set out confident of success, and were going back defeated.

If Miss Campbell's disappointment could possibly have been increased, it was owing to the fact of its being caused by Aristobulus Ursiclos. She had some reason to blame this great culprit and vent her wrath on his head, and she made good use of the privilege. Her uncles would have been very ill-advised had they tried to defend him. No! it was perfectly evident that this clumsy fellow, of whom they were little thinking, had taken the boat and sailed right in front of the sunset on purpose, and such a wrong could never be forgiven.

Needless to say that after this rating, Aristobulus, who tried to excuse himself by ridiculing the idea of the Green Ray, returned by boat to Oban, and it was well he did, for probably he would not have been offered a seat in the carriage, nor one on the box even.

Thus twice the sun had set under conditions quite favourable to the observation of the phenomenon, and twice Miss Campbell had exposed her eyesight to the dazzling glare, all in vain! First of all the rescue of Oliver Sinclair, and then Aristobulus's boat had caused her to miss opportunities which might be long in recurring! It is true the circumstances were not the same in both cases, and Miss Campbell made excuses for the one as much as she blamed the other, so who could have accused her of partiality?

The following day Oliver Sinclair was sauntering dreamily along the sea-shore.

“Who was this Mr. Ursiclos? A relation of Miss Campbell's, or simply a friend? At any rate, he was evidently on very familiar terms with the family from the way in which the young lady scolded him for his awkwardness. But what could it matter to Oliver Sinclair? If he wished to know, he had but to ask either of the two brothers.” This was precisely what the young man did not care to do.

However, he had plenty of opportunities of doing so, scarcely a day passed without meeting the brothers—who could flatter himself that he had ever seen the one without the other?—and sometimes their niece with them, walking along the shore. They talked of all kinds of things, but especially of the weather, which in the open air is not always a mere excuse for something to say. Would they ever get another perfect evening, to enable them to try their fortune at the island of Seil once more? They had their doubts about it; indeed, since those two fine days, the 2nd and 14th of August, the sky had been very uncertain; there were nothing but storm-clouds, hazy horizons, and twilight mists, enough to drive to despair any student of astronomy anxious to make a survey of some particular corner of the celestial globe!

Why not confess that Oliver Sinclair was now bewitched with the Green Ray quite as much as Miss Campbell? He had entered into the spirit of the search with the beautiful young girl, with her he had studied the realms of space, and he followed up the fancy with no less eagerness, not to say impatience, than did his young companion. Ah! he was not an Aristobulus Ursiclos with his head in the clouds of lofty science, treating with contempt this simple optical phenomenon! They both understood each other, and both were anxious to be of that rare number of privileged beings to whom the Green Ray might reveal itself.

“We will see it. Miss Campbell; we will see it,” repeated Oliver Sinclair, “even if I have to go and light it up myself! In fact, it was my fault that you missed seeing it the first time, and I am as much to blame as that Mr. Ursiclos—a relation of yours, I believe?”

“No. My betrothed, it would seem,” replied Miss Campbell, walking on somewhat hurriedly to her uncles, who were a little way in front of them.

Her betrothed! It was singular the effect this reply, especially the tone in which it was made, had on Oliver Sinclair. After all why should this young pedant not be her fiancé? At any rate, under those circumstances, his presence at Oban might be accounted for. Because he had been clumsy enough to come between Miss Campbell and the sun, it did not follow—What did not follow? Oliver Sinclair would perhaps have been at a loss to say.

Besides, two days later, Aristobulus Ursiclos again turned up; Oliver often saw him in company with the brothers, who would not altogether treat him coldly, and he seemed to be on the best of terms with them. The young artist and the savant had met on one or two occasions, and the brothers at last remembered to introduce them to each other.

“Mr. Aristobulus Ursiclos, of Dumfries.”

“Mr. Oliver Sinclair, of Edinburgh!”

The young men bowed stiffly to each other, evidently there was not much sympathy between these two characters. The one examined the sky as though he would bring down the stars, the other as if to forecast the weather; the artist made no attempt to figure on the pedestal of art, the savant made for himself a pedestal of science, on which he might strike attitudes.

As to Miss Campbell, she treated Aristobulus with the greatest coolness. If he were present, she quite ignored him; if he happened to pass her, she turned her head the other way; in a word, as has been before remarked, she most distinctly cut him, and her uncles had some trouble to smooth matters over. However this may be, it was their opinion that all would turn out well, especially if this whimsical ray would but allow itself to be seen.

Meanwhile, Aristobulus eyed Oliver Sinclair over his spectacles, a frequent habit with short-sighted people, who want to look without seeming to do so; and what he saw—the young man's assiduous attention to Miss Campbell, and the amiable manner in which she always received him—was not altogether calculated to please him, but highly confident in his own powers of attraction, he maintained a very proper reserve.

Meantime, this changeable weather was enough to try any one's patience to the utmost. In the hope of seeing a clear horizon at sunset, were it but for a few moments, they made two or three excursions to the island of Seil, in which Aristobulus could not find time to join. But all in vain! the 23rd of August arrived without any sight of the phenomenon.

This fancy had become a fixed and besetting idea, which left no room for anything else; they dreamt of it night and day, till one might have feared it would engender some new kind of monomania. Under this one intense thought, colours all seemed to be transformed into one shade: the blue sky became green, the roads were green, the sea-shore was green, the rocks were green, water and wine seemed green as absinthe; even the brothers imagined they were dressed in green, and felt like two big paroquets, taking green snuff out of a green snuff-box. In fact, it was a case of green fever! They were all seized with a kind of daltonism, and oculists might have had wherewithal to make interesting notes in their ophthalmological reviews. This state of things could not last long.

Fortunately Oliver Sinclair hit upon an idea.

“Miss Campbell,” said he one day, “and you, gentlemen, it seems to me that, considering everything, Oban is not the best place possible for our observation of the phenomenon in question.”

“And whose fault is that?” replied Miss Campbell, looking at the two culprits, who held down their heads.

“Here, there is no sea-horizon!” continued the young artist, “so that we are obliged to go as far as Seil to get one, at the risk too of not arriving there at the right moment.

“This is very evident,” said Miss Campbell; “in fact, I don't know why my uncles ever thought of choosing this horrible place for our experiment.”

“My dear Helena!” exclaimed her Uncle Sam, scarcely knowing what to say, “we thought—”

“Yes, we thought—the same thing—” added Uncle Sib, coming to his brother's assistance.

“That the sun would most certainly set every evening upon the horizon at Oban—”

“Since Oban is situated on the sea-coast!”

“And you thought wrong, uncles,” replied Miss Campbell; “very wrong, indeed, as it never sets there.”

“Just so,” resumed Sam, “it is those tiresome islands which obstruct our view.”

“You really don't intend to have them blown up?” asked Miss Campbell.

“It should have been done long ago, had it been possible,” replied Sib, in a decided tone.

“Nevertheless, we cannot go and take up our abode on the island of Seil,” observed Sam.

“And why not?”

“If you absolutely wish it, dear Helena—”

“Yes, absolutely.”

“Let us go, then!” said the brothers, with an air of resignation. And these two submissive beings declared themselves ready to leave Oban at once.

Here Oliver Sinclair interposed.

“Miss Campbell,” said he, “unless you have set your heart upon it, I think you might do better than take up your quarters at Seil.”

“Let us hear your opinion, Mr. Sinclair; and if your advice is good, my uncles will not refuse to follow it.”

The brothers nodded assent with an automatical movement so identical that never perhaps had they looked so much alike.

“The island of Seil,” continued Oliver Sinclair, “is most certainly not adapted for a lengthened stay, not even for a few days. If you have to exercise your patience, Miss Campbell, it will but be for your ultimate benefit. Besides, I have noticed at Seil that the view of the sea is somewhat limited by the configuration of the coast. If, by chance, we had to wait longer than we thought for, and our stay were prolonged for some weeks, it might happen that the sun, which is now retrograding towards the west, would at last set behind Colonsay, or Oransay, or even Islay, and our observation would again be baffled, for want of a sufficiently large expanse of sea.”

“Truly,” replied Miss Campbell, “this would be the last blow to our ill-fortune—”

“And which we can perhaps avoid by looking for a place beyond this archipelago, bounded only by the wide Atlantic.”

“And do you know of such a place, Mr. Sinclair?” eagerly asked Miss Campbell.

The brothers anxiously awaited the young man's answer. What would he reply? Where on earth would their niece's caprice finally land them? Upon what farmost extremity of the globe would they have to settle themselves in order to satisfy her whim?

Oliver Sinclair's reply at once reassured them.

“Miss Campbell,” said he, “not far from here, there is an island which seems to me to be just the place. It is situated beyond the heights of Mull, which shut in the western horizon of Oban, and is one of the smallest of the Hebrides, standing out farthest into the Atlantic; it is the charming island of Iona.”

“Iona!” cried Miss Campbell, “Iona, uncles, oh! why are we not there now?”

“We will be there to-morrow,” replied Sib.

“To-morrow, before sunset,” added Sam.

“Let us be off, then,” said Miss Campbell, “and if we do not find at Iona a wide expanse of sea, you must understand, uncles, we will search for some other point on the coast, from John o' Groat's to the Land's End, and if that does not do—”

“It is very simple,” said Oliver Sinclair, “we will go round the world!”

Le Rayon vert/Chapitre XII Promień zielony/Rozdział XII