“You may say what you please about O’Sullivan, Captain Macdonald. Ecod, he may go to the devil for me,” Creagh told him.
“Well, and for me too; ’fore God, the sooner the better.”
“If there is to be no throat-cutting to warm the blood maybe we had better push on to the bothy, gentlemen. I’m fain niddered [perishing] with the cold. This Highland mist goes to the marrow,” I suggested merrily, and linking arms with them I moved forward.
In ten minutes we had a roaring fire ablaze, and were washing down with usquebaugh the last trace of unkindness. After we had eaten our bannocks and brose we lay in the shine of the flame and revelled in the blessed heat, listening to the splash of the rain outside. We were still encompassed by a cordon of the enemy, but for the present we were content to make the most of our unusual comfort.
“Here’s a drammoch left in the flask. I give you the restoration, gentlemen,” cried Donald.
“I wonder where the Prince is this night,” I said after we had drunk the toast.
We fell to a meditative sombre silence, and presently Captain Roy began to sing softly one of those touching Jacobite melodies that go to the source of tears like rain to the roots of flowers. Donald had one of the rare voices that carry the heart to laughter and to sobs. The singer’s song, all pathos and tenderness, played on the chords of our emotion like a harp. My eyes began to smart. Creagh muttered something about the peat-smoke affecting his, and I’m fain to admit that I rolled over with my face from the fire to hide the tell-tale tears. The haunting pathetic wistfulness of the third stanza shook me with sobs.
| “On hills that are by right his ain, He roams a lanely stranger; On ilka hand he’s pressed by want, On ilka hand by danger.” |
“Ohon! Ohon!” groaned Donald. “The evil day! The evil day! Wae’s me for our bonnie Hieland laddie!”
“May the Blessed Mother keep him safe from all enemies and dangers!” said Creagh softly.