"And perhaps, then," said she, with a charming smile, "writing it down would spoil it altogether? But you will ask them to sing it for me."
He said a word or two in the Gaelic to Sandy, who was rowing stroke; and Sandy answered with a short, quick laugh of assent.
"I have asked them if they would drink your health," Macleod said, "and they have not refused. It would be a great compliment to them if you would fill out the whiskey yourself; here is my flask."
She took that formidable vessel in her small hands, and the men rested on their oars; and then the metal cup was passed along. Whether it was the dram, or whether it was the old familiar chorus they struck up—
"Fhir a bhata (na horo eile)
Fhir a bhata (na horo eile)
Fhir a bhata (na horo eile)
Chead soire slann leid ge thobh a' theid u,"
certain it is that the boat swung forward with a new strength, and erelong they beheld in the distance the walls of Castle Dare. And here was Janet at the small quay, greatly distressed because of the discomfort to which Miss White must have been subjected.
"But I have been telling Sir Keith," she said, with a sweet smile, "that I have come through the most beautiful place I have ever seen in the world."
This was not, however, what she was saying to herself when she reached the privacy of her own room. Her thoughts took a different turn.
"And if it does seem impossible"—this was her inward speech to herself—"that those wild murders should have been committed in so beautiful a place, at least there will be a fair chance of one occurring when I tell him that I have signed an engagement that will last till Christmas. But what good could come of being in a hurry?"