When he came to the ditch, the drawbrig was down. To the warm airs of the day the windows, high and low, were open; a look of throng life was over the house, and in-by some one plucked angrily at the strings of a harp. Reek rose lazy and blue over the chimneys, the smell of roasting meats and rich broths hung on the air.
Under a tree got Adventurer and deep in thought. And soon the harping came to an end. A girl stepped to the bridge and over into the garden. She took to the left by the butter-house and into My Lady's Canter, lined with foreign trees. Along the wide far road came a man to meet her, good-shaped, in fine clothes, tartan trews fitting close on leg and haunch, and a leather jacket held at the middle by a crioslach.
Under his tree stood Adventurer as they passed back, and close beside him the courtier pushed the hilt of a small-sword to his back and took the woman in his arms.
“Then if ye must ken,” said he, shamefacedly, “I am for the road to-morrow.”
The girl—ripe and full, not over-tall, well balanced, her hair waved back from over brown eyes, gathered in a knot and breaking to a curl on the nape of the neck like a wave on the shell-white shore—got hot at the skin, and a foot drummed the gravel in an ill temper.
“For yon silly cause again?” she asked, her lips thinning over her teeth.
“For the old cause,” said he; “my father's, my dead brothers', my clan's, ours for a hundred years. Do not lightly the cause, my dear; it may be your children's yet.”
“You never go with my will,” quo' the girl again. “Here am I, far from a household of cheery sisters, so lonely, so lonely! Oh! Morag and Aoirig, and the young ones! were I back among them from this brave tomb!”
“Tomb, sweet!”
“Tomb said I, and tomb is it!” cried the woman, in a storm. “Who is here to sing with me and comfort me in the misty mornings, to hearten me when you are at wood or hill? The dreary woods, the dreary, dreary shore—they give me the gloom! My God, what a grey day!”