"Och!" said Keppoch, "I just gied the fiery cross to Duncan o' Taliskier. He is no to say a very right son of Ian at any rate. Ye see, his mother was a woman from the north—from the country of the Grants. And as for the father o' him, faith, there was nane kenned to rights wha he was—even hersel'. But for a' that, Duncan o' Taliskier is wonderful handy to keep about a house for jobs o' this kind."
"It is indeed excellently invented," said Scarlett, approvingly, "for I learned long ago that 'always sacrifice your worst troops—your allies if you can'—is an ancient and well-considered military maxim."
The chief went on: "You will be wondering what Keppoch does here on the edge of this country o' Camerons? Faith, ye may well wonder! But there's a bit plantation of McDonald's over the hill there, and though they have taken Lochiell's name they find it for the good of their healths to pay a bit cess to Keppoch—just as the peetifu' burgher bodies of Inverness do; for money a loon is feared o' Colin—Guid kens what for."
Wat and Scarlett nodded. They were too completely ignorant of the niceties of the state of society into the midst of which they were cast to venture on any reply.
"But ye shall not bide here," said Keppoch; "ye are instantly to come your ways with me to Keppoch, my head place, where my castle is. This bit townie here is well enough, but it is not fit for the like of gentlemen that have been in France even to set their feet within."
So in a little while Wat and Scarlett found themselves following Coll o' the Cows and his ragged regiment towards "Keppoch, my head place, where my castle is."
First there went a dozen or so of small, black-felled, large-horned cattle, mostly young, which constantly put their heads over their shoulders and looked back towards the pastures they had left, routing and roaring most excruciatingly. Then came a round dozen of Keppoch's men urging them on, sometimes with the flat of the scabbard and sometimes pricking them with the naked points of their claymores.
On the hills above skirmished an irregular force of small light men and half-naked lads. Keppoch pointed them out to his companions.
"Yonder goes my flying column," he said, cunningly, "for so it is designated in the books of war. Keppoch is not an ignorant man—far from it, as ye shall know ere ye win clear of him. He did not go to the schools of Edinburgh for the best part of three winters for nothing. That was where he learned the English so well—frae the 'prentice lads o' the Lawnmarket—fair good drinkers they are, too, and as ready wi' their nieves as the prettiest gentleman with his blade."
He considered a little, as if measuring his own qualifications.