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For some
time the girl remained
where he had left her, looking out past the
islet and over the
bright sea. Then with a start, as one who throws
off preoccupation and puts energy
again upon its mettle, she broke into a rapid
and decisive walk. She also was much incensed by what
had passed. She had
forgotten where she was. And I beheld her
walk straight into the borders of the quicksand where it is
most abrupt and dangerous. Two or three
steps farther and her life would have been in serious jeopardy, when I slid down the face of
the sand hill, which is
there precipitous, and, running
halfway forward, called to her to stop.
She
did so, and turned
round. There was not a tremor
of fear in her behavior, and she marched
directly up to me like a queen. I
was barefoot, and clad like a
common sailor, save for an Egyptian scarf round my waist; and she probably took me at first for some one
from the fisher village, straying
after bait. As for her, when I thus saw her face to face, her eyes set steadily and imperiously upon mine, I was filled with admiration and astonishment, and thought her even more beautiful than I had looked to find her. Nor could I think enough of one who, acting with so much boldness, yet preserved a maidenly
air that was both quaint and
engaging; for my wife
kept an old-fashioned precision of manner
through all her admirable life--an excellent
thing in woman, since it sets another value on her sweet familiarities.
"What does this mean?" she asked.
"You were
walking," I told her, "directly
into Graden Floe."
Slapp Happy: A Little Something (Link) and
The Secret (Link)
Excerpt:
Robert Louis Stevenson, “The
Pavilion On The Links,” first published in Cornhill Magazine 42-43, London
(Sept-Oct 1880).
The country, I have
said, was mixed sand hill and links, LINKS being a Scottish name
for sand which has ceased drifting and become more or
less solidly covered with turf. The pavilion stood on an even
space: a little behind it, the wood began in a hedge of elders huddled together by the
wind; in front, a few tumbled sand hills stood between it and
the sea. An outcropping of rock had formed a bastion for the sand, so
that there was here a promontory in the
coast line between two shallow bays; and just beyond the
tides, the rock again cropped out and formed an islet of small
dimensions but strikingly designed. The quicksands were of great extent
at low water, and had an infamous
reputation in the country. Close in shore, between the islet
and the promontory, it was said they would swallow a
man in four minutes and a half; but there may
have been little ground for this precision. The district was alive with rabbits, and
haunted by gulls which made a continual piping about the pavilion. On summer days the outlook was bright and even gladsome; but at sundown in September, with a high wind, and a heavy surf
rolling in close along the links, the place told of nothing
but dead mariners and sea disaster. A ship beating to
windward on the horizon, and a huge truncheon of
wreck half buried in the sands at my feet,
completed the innuendo of the scene.
Note: Ever since
I saw Gerard Manley
Hopkins' letter to Robert Bridges from October 28, 1886, posing the future poet laureate the
question: "Have you read the Pavilion on the Links in the volume of Arabian
Nights (not one of them)? The
absconding banker is admirably characterised, the horror is nature itself,
and the whole piece is genius
from beginning to end.", I
have wanted to experience Robert
Louis Stevenson's story. It took me a bit of searching
to locate a non-electronic copy, but's it's finally mine and I'm happily diving in.
Excerpt: Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Pavilion On The Links,” first published in Cornhill Magazine 42-43, London (Sept-Oct 1880).
