“He knows,” she said.
“Well,” cried Delia, “I want to save those people. If they, despite all warnings, have remained obdurate, there will be a horried vengeance taken, you know, belike?”
“I know,” said Lady Dalrymple.
“But if they have taken the oaths—and it is blown abroad enough—no one, for shame, could touch them.”
“Do you think Sir John will answer you?”
“I will essay it,” answered Delia.
A little silence fell; an unusual look of resolution came into Lady Dalrymple’s gentle face as she gazed into the fire; Delia, standing with her hands clasped on the chair-back gazed upon her fairness with sick aversion that mounted to her brain and set her mouth into lines of cruelty. At last, with a shiver of satin, Lady Dalrymple moved and looked at the other.
“The Macdonalds have taken the oaths,” she said quietly, “but it will be suppressed. That is Viscount Stair’s work—and the Earl of Breadalbane’s.”
“I thought so!” cried Delia fiercely. “The Viscount’s work, you say! I think Sir John has had a hand in it.”
“I will not discuss my husband’s politics,” interrupted Lady Dalrymple. “I tell you this because I would prevent an injustice and a crime. It is true, and the Macdonalds are doomed, if you can save them—do so—”