Max stopped short by a block of stone, against which he struck, and only saved himself from falling by stretching out his hands.
The stone suggested resting for a few minutes, and he sat down and listened, but the silence was awful. No cry of bird or bleat of sheep fell upon his ear, and the mist and darkness had in a few minutes so shut him in that he could distinguish nothing half a dozen yards away.
The sensation of restfulness was, however, pleasant; and he sat there for some time, trying to think of his plans, but in a confused way, for the incidents that had taken place at Dunroe would intrude as soon as he began to make plans.
“How stupid I am!” he cried, suddenly starting up with a shiver of cold, for the damp mist seemed to chill him, and for the first time he awoke to the fact that his feet and legs were saturated. “I must get on to some hotel, and to-morrow make for the nearest station, and go home.”
Just then, for a moment, it occurred to him that he had left everything at Dunroe; but his thoughts went off in another direction, and then in another and another, finally resting upon the idea of the possibility of getting to the nearest station.
But where was the nearest station? Stirling. The line to Oban had not been made in those days; and now Max began to grow confused, as he recalled the fact that there was only one railway line running through the Western Highlands, and whether that were to the north, south, east, or west, he could not tell.
Neither at that hour could he tell which way these quarters lay. All he knew was that he was in a thick mist somewhere in the mountains, high up or low down in one of the hollows, and that if he stirred from where he stood, he must literally feel his way.
For a moment the idea came upon him that he had better stop till daylight, but just then a peculiar muffled cry smote his ears, and a thrill of terror ran through him as he felt that it would be impossible to sit there all through the long hours of the night in the cold and darkness. So he started at once, the cry he had heard influencing his direction, for he struck off the opposite way.
He made very slow progress, but at the end of a few minutes he knew that he was descending a rapid slope, and he went stumbling on through tall heather which was laden with moisture. Every now and then, too, he struck against some stone, but he persevered, for he fancied that the mist was rather less thick as he descended.
Then he tripped, and went headlong into the drenched heather, and struggled up with the feeling of confusion increasing as he stood trying to pierce the gloom.