"I will help you—but only because I must," said Farish M'Kissock harshly. "And you must help me to help you—to your own hurt."
He leaned forward, panting, as if enraged over his own weakness of body. The engineer rose, regarding him as if not very sure of his sanity, and, having picked up the candle, assisted him to his feet. He stood for a moment supporting himself by the wall, his knees giving and recovering under him, and then the giddiness passed. He took a tentative step or two and presently was able to follow his rescuer from the cell.
"Is there anyone in the gun-room?" he asked in an anxious whisper at the foot of the steps. Lord Jura listened closely for a moment or two at the panel above, drew it open a little, and looking down again, shook his head. He pulled the panel wide and then held out a hand to his follower; who took it very reluctantly and, with its aid, reached the room above, step by slow, uncertain step.
"Sit down and rest for a minute or two," suggested the engineer.
"Not here," he demurred. "It wouldn't be safe—too near the tunnel. We must have help at hand when we meet them. What time is it? They'll be at dinner now. Take me along the servants' passage and by the terrace to the Pipers' Port: we should meet no one that way."
But the other, a hand at his tremulous lips, was looking with mazed eyes about the remembered room that he had so often seen in his dreams during the age-long time of torment he had endured. His rods lay ready for use in the long rack where he had left them. A pair of guns his father had given him stood in their usual place at one end of the full stand adorning one wall. The head of his first stag still hung above the mantel, and the big wild-cat he had killed in the wood behind his hut on the cliffs glared at him out of its glass eyes from over the door leading to the pantry. That corner at least of the castle was quite unchanged.
He caught sight of his own reflection in the plate-glass casing which covered another full stand of guns, and turned away from it with a grimace of distaste. He had certainly changed, and very much for the worse, himself, since he had last seen Loquhariot. He glanced at Farish M'Kissock, the gamekeeper's son with whom he had fought, as he almost blushed to remember, about a girl, and was still more shocked to see the skeleton-like, decrepit-looking old man regarding him with hot, inimical eyes from under shaggy down-drawn white eyebrows above which hung long matted locks of grey hair darkly discoloured with drying blood; for they two had been headstrong lads together, friends in some sort, companions at least in many a scapegrace prank.
"Ay," said Farish M'Kissock unpleasantly, as though reading the thought that ran through his mind. "I'm far worse-looking than you are, my lord. And something of that I am owing your lordship. But never mind now; we have other matters before us first, and it will be well to attend to them before it may be too late."
The engineer started at that. His head was not very clear and he had for the moment almost forgotten—
"Come on, then, M'Kissock," said he, and blew out the candle he was still unconsciously carrying and led the way through the little pantry behind.