"What do you mean, Mrs. M'Gregor?"
"Now, Mr. Keppel, laddie, ye're angry with me, and like enough I am a meddlesome auld woman. But I know what a man will do for shining een and a winsome face—nane better to my sorrow—and twa times have I heard the Warning."
Stuart stood up in real perplexity. "Pardon my density, Mrs.
M'Gregor, but—er—the Warning? To what 'warning' do you refer?"
Seating herself in the chair before the writing-table, Mrs. M'Gregor shook her head pensively. "What would it be," she said softly, "but the Pibroch o' the M'Gregors?"
Stuart came across and leaned upon a corner of the table. "The
Pibroch of the M'Gregors?" he repeated.
"Nane other. 'Tis said to be Rob Roy's ain piper that gives warning when danger threatens ane o' the M'Gregors or any they love."
Stuart restrained a smile, and, "A well-meaning but melancholy retainer!" he commented.
"As well as I hear you now, laddie, I heard the pibroch on the day a certain woman first crossed my threshold, nigh thirty years ago, in Inverary. And as plainly as I heard it wailing then, I heard it the first evening that Miss Dorian came to this house!"
Torn between good-humoured amusement and real interest, "If I remember rightly," said Stuart, "Mlle. Dorian first called here just a week ago, and immediately before I returned from an Infirmary case?"
"Your memory is guid, Mr. Keppel."