The flight of the heron

by D. K. Broster

“I think you had best call off your men altogether, Captain Windham, if they are to save their own skins!” And in the uneasy silence which he had procured Ewen added, with some exultation, “It is my own clan, the Camerons; they are coming down the West Bow into the Grassmarket. There will not be much left of you, my good fellows, if you so much as scratch me!” And, seeing the effect of his words, he tugged aside the curtain, flung open the partly shattered casement, and called out in Gaelic to the line of kilted figures just emerging from the West Bow.

The long yell of the slogan answered him as he swung quickly back on guard. But there was no need of his sword. Prestonpans had taught the Castle garrison exaggerated terror of those who uttered such cries. The soldiers, the sergeant included, were already huddling towards the door, and Keith Windham was not in time to get between them and the exit. He stamped his foot in fury.

“Do your duty, you dirty cowards!” he shouted, pointing at the figure by the window. But a second heartshaking yell came up from the Grassmarket: ‘Chlanna nan con, thigibh an so, thigibh an so . . .’ Perfectly deaf to their officer’s objurgations, the English soldiers were occupied only with the question of which should be first from the room. Keith seized the last fugitive by the collar, but the only result of this appeal to force was that the man, who was very powerful, shook him off, thrust him back with small regard for his rank, and banged the door behind himself. Captain Windham, livid, threw himself upon the handle to pluck it open again—but the knob merely turned in his hand. The violent slam had evidently shot to the bolt on the outside. Hunter and quarry—only now it was hard to know which was which—were equally prisoners.

Ewen, over at the window, laughed aloud; he could not help it. “You seem always to be unfortunate in your men, Captain Windham,” he remarked, and, shaking the cloak off his left arm, slid his blade back into the scabbard. “I fear it is I who shall have to ask you for your sword. Would you prefer to give it up to me before the guard arrives?”

He got it . . . but not in the fashion which he had expected. Keith, quite beside himself with mortification and rage, had already whipped out his weapon while Ewen, with bent head, was sheathing his own, and now, really blind to the fact that the Highlander was for the moment defenceless and off his guard, Captain Windham sprang furiously at him without warning of any sort. Ewen had no chance to draw again, no space to spring aside, no time for anything but to catch wildly at the blade in the hope of diverting it. At the cost of a badly cut right hand he succeeded in saving himself from being spitted, and the deflected point, sliding through his clutching fingers, went by his hip into the panelling where, both men loosing their hold at the same moment, the weapon stuck for the fraction of a second, and then fell ringing to the floor.

Horrified and sobered, Keith had sprung back; Ewen, after a first instinctive movement to catch him by the throat, had checked himself, and, clasping his bleeding hand tightly with the other, leant back against the wall and looked at him with a mixture of sternness and enquiry. His breath was coming rather quickly, but, compared with his assailant, he was the image of calm.

“My God!” stammered the Englishman, as white as a sheet. “I never saw . . .” He indicated Ardroy’s sheathed sword. “I might have killed you. . . .” He took a long breath and drew a hand across his eyes. Still looking at him curiously his victim fished out his lace-bordered handkerchief and began to wrap it round his palm, a very inadequate precaution, for in a moment the cambric was crimson.

In another Keith was at his side. “How deeply is it cut? Let me . . .” And he pulled out his own more solid handkerchief.

“I don’t know,” answered Ewen composedly, putting back his Mechlin ruffle, which had slipped down again. “Pretty deeply, it seems.” He surrendered his hand. “Thanks; over mine then—tie it tighter still.”

“Good God, I might have killed you!” said Keith again under his breath as he bandaged and knotted. “I . . . I lost my temper, but, as Heaven’s my witness, I thought you had your sword out.”