“My name is Ronald,” he said, “and I am a prince of the Macdonalds of Glencoe.”

The horsewoman coughed and shivered again before she answered; she had noted the half-sullen, half-proud defiance of his bearing and replied to that:

“Why do you speak so?” she said. “You give your speech a turn of bitterness.”

He came still closer and laid his hand on her fallen reins.

“I thought you were a Campbell,” he said, and watched for the effect of the loathed name on her; there was none; she merely shook her head.

“I am a stranger,” she answered. “I came with my kinsfolk on a mere family affair—”

His face lightened.

“I saw them through the mist,” he said.

She looked round her.

“And now the mist hath gone and I am utterly lost.” She shivered.