On we went now merrily enough, I singing to make the road seem shorter.
But it was getting darker and darker every minute. By the time we—that is, Dash and I, for I ever look upon a dog as a companion second only to a human being, and often far before one—reached Ault na Geoul, a wild, dark mountain stream that came roaring through a gorge not five hundred yards above, forming many a white and chafing rapid, and many a deep, dark pool, in which they said the kelpies[A] dwelt, night had so far fallen that scarcely could I see to gather a pocketful of round stones, the need for which will be seen presently.
It was just here where the short cut commenced, and once safely over the hill skirting one of the most dangerous cliffs in the Highlands, we should only have two miles further to walk.
We forded the stream, which was low at present, and soon after I found the little winding path, and we commenced the ascent.
The brae, and indeed all the hill, was covered with drooping birch. There was not a star to be seen to-night, and clouds which must have been half a mile through hung low over the mountains. Not that we could see them. Oh no; so dangerously dark was it that if I stretched my gun straight out in front of me I could not see the muzzle.
You will now find out what was to be the use of the stones I had collected. You must know, then, that the little path through the birch wood led almost directly up a hill or brae fully one thousand feet high, and directly on to and at right angles to the edge of the fearful precipice I have already mentioned. It then turned off to the right. The capital letter T will represent a plan of the situation. The shaft of the letter is the pathway leading upwards from the glen and the stream below, the upper or cross-bar is the edge of the perpendicular cliff, and close to this we must get before turning off to the right, and descending as near to the precipice edge as possible.
So long as the path led upwards I was safe enough, but by-and-by we were on level ground, and now the real danger commenced. We might walk straight over that black and fearful cliff.
In my boyhood’s days, myself and my companions, on many a dark, “mirk” night, had done as I was about to do now, and we never had an accident.
I could not have been more than from forty to sixty yards from the cliff edge, when I ordered Dash to keep close behind me. Then bending low to the ground, I threw a stone a few yards ahead of me, listening intently. I heard it fall on solid ground.
We cautiously advanced some distance, and I threw out another. That too I heard fall, and so did the third and fourth.