"The nearest is the Macruadh, sir!" answered a highlander who had come from work in the garden to see what was going on.
"I cannot apply to him; the fellow is one of his own men!"
"The Macruadh does what is just!" rejoined the man.
His master vouchsafed him no reply. He would not show his wrath against the chief: it would be undignified!
"Take him to the tool-house, and lock him up till I think what to do with him. Bring me the key."
The butler led the way, and Hector followed between his captors.
They might have been showing him to his bed-room, so calm was he:
Bob gone to fetch the chief, his imprisonment could not last!—and
for the indignity, was he not in the right!
As Mr. Palmer left the kitchen, his eye fell on Mercy.
"Go to your room," he said angrily, and turned from her.
She obeyed in silence, consoling herself that from her window she could see the arrival of the chief. Nor had she watched long when she saw him coming along the road with Rob. At the gate she lost sight of them. Presently she heard voices in the hall, and crept down the stair far enough to hear.
"I could commit you for a breach of the peace, Mr. Palmer," she heard the chief say. "You ought to have brought the man to me. As a magistrate I order his release. But I give my word he shall be forthcoming when legally required."