“Montagu? I never heard that.”
“Took his life in his hand to come back to that de’il’s caldron where the red bluid ran like a mountain burn. It iss the boast of the Macdonalds that they always pay their debts both to friend and foe. Fine have I paid mine. He will be thinking me the true friend in his hour of need,” finished Donald bitterly.
“You don’t know him. The temper of the man is not so grudging. His joy in your escape will help deaden his own pain. Besides, what could you do for him if you were with him at the end? ’Twould be only one more sacrifice.”
The grim dour Highland sternness hung heavy on Donald’s face.
“I could stand shoulder to shoulder with him and curse the whigs at all events. I could cry with him ‘God save King James’ in the teeth of the sidier roy.”
Volney clapped his hands softly. “Hear, hear!” he cried with flaming eyes. “Almost thou persuadest me to be a Jacobite.”
The Gael turned to him impetuously, his blue eyes (as I conceive) moist with emotion.
“Man, could I persuade you to be saving the lad? It was for this that I waited in your rooms to see you. They say that you are a favourite of princes, that what you ask you get. Do for once a fine thing and ask this boy’s life.”
“They exaggerate my power. But for argument’s sake suppose it true. Why should I ask it? What have I to gain by it?”
Volney, his eyes fixed on the fire, asked the question as much to himself as to the Highlander. The manner of his tone suggested that it was not a new one to him.