“Fall in with what he might, he is not the man to give up his game easily,” said Patrick, somewhat keenly.
“Whatever may have befallen him,” said Murdoch, “we can hardly hope to see him hereabouts to-night.”
“I hope we may see him at Drummin,” said Patrick; “for as the night is now drooping down so fast, he will most readily seek the straightest way thither. So, as thou hast now made sure of a great hart of sixteen for Sir Allan, we may as well turn our steps thitherward without more delay.”
On reaching Drummin, Patrick Stewart’s first inquiry was for his brother Sir Walter. He had not returned home; but it was yet early in the night, and he might have been led away to such a distance as to require the greater part of the night to bring him home. The hart was borne up to the hall in triumph, and exhibited before Sir Allan, with the arrow still sticking in his neck. The old man’s countenance was filled with joy and exultation when he beheld it. The Lady Stradawn could not contain her triumph.
“So, Murdoch,” said she, “thou art the lucky man who hath killed the much longed for venison! Thou art the lucky man who hath brought thy father the food for which his soul so yearneth! There is something of good omen for thee in this, my boy!”
“A noble head!—a great hart of sixteen, indeed,” said Sir Allan. “Aye, aye, that is a head, that is a head indeed! Yet have I slain many as fine in my time. Aye, aye,—but those days are gone; och, hey! gone indeed. See what a cuach his horn hath. Yet that which I slew up at Loch Aven had a bigger cuach than this one by a great deal. As I live, you might have slaked your thirst from the hollow of it the drowthiest day you ever saw. Yet this is a good hart—a noble hart of sixteen,—aye, aye! hoch-hey! But, hey! what’s this? A goose-winged shaft? Did I not tell ye that my dream spake of an eagle’s wing? His heart will be naught after all—naught, naught—och, hey! och, hey!”
“Nay, we shall soon convince thee to the contrary, father,” said Murdoch, motioning to the attendants to lay the deer down upon the hearth. “I will forthwith break him under thine own eye, and thou shalt see, and judge for thyself.”
Murdoch then drawing forth his knife, began to open up the animal according to the strictest rules laid down for breaking a deer, as this operation was called, and on proceeding to slit up the slough, to the great wonder of every one, it was discovered that the old man was right. The heart was indeed so very small that it might very well have been said to have been naught. Murdoch was dismayed for a moment at an omen so very inauspicious, which, in his own mind, he felt was more than enough to overthrow all the fair prognostics which his mother had so evidently drawn from his success. The Lady herself was equally disconcerted.
“Naught, naught!” whimpered Sir Allan. “’Tis an ill omen for thee, boy. Thou shalt ne’er fly with an eagle’s wing—nay, nay! Aye, aye! Thou art ever doomed to gobble i’ the muddy stagnant waters like a midden-gander.—Uch, aye! och, hey!”
“The fiend take the old carl for his saying!” whispered Murdoch angrily aside to his mother.