“There is no one here but ourselves.”

But now Aunt Elspeth half rose, with supplicating arms:

“Muireall! Muireall! Muireall! O muirnean, muirnean!”

I saw Archibald Campbell shaking as though he were a child and no strong man. “Will you be telling us this, Elspeth,” he began in a hoarse voice—“will you be telling me this: if Muireall is in the room, beyond Rory there, who will be at the door? Who is trying to come in at the door?”

“It’s a man. I do not know the man. It is a man. It is Death, maybe. I do not know the man. O muirnean, mo muirnean!”

But now the great gaunt black dog—terrible in his seeing blindness he was to me—began again his savage snarling, his bristling insensate fury. He had ceased a moment while our voices filled the room, and had sidled a little way towards the place where Aunt Elspeth saw Muireall, whining low as he did so, and swishing his tail furtively along the whitewashed flagstones.

I know not what awful thing would have happened. It seemed to me that Death was coming to all of us.

But at that moment we all heard the sound of a galloping horse. There was a lull in the wind, and the rain lashed no more like a streaming whistling whip. Even Rory crouched silent, his nostrils quivering, his curled snout showing his fangs.

Gorromalt stood, listening intently.

“By the living God,” he exclaimed suddenly, his eyes like a goaded bull’s—“I know that horse. Only one horse runs like that at the gallop. ’Tis the grey stallion I sold three months ago to the man at Drumdoon—ay, ay, for the son of the man at Drumdoon! A horse to ride for the shooting—a good horse for the hills—that was what he wanted! Ay, ay, by God, a horse for the son of the man at Drumdoon! It’s the grey stallion: no other horse in the Straths runs like that—d’ye hear? d’ye hear? Elspeth, woman, is there hearing upon you for that? Hey, tlot-a-tlot, tlot-a-tlot, tlot-tlot-tlot-tlot, tlot-a-tlot, tlot-tlot-tlot! I tell you, woman, it’s the grey stallion I sold to Drumdoon: it’s that and no other! Ay, by the Sorrow, it’s Drumdoon’s son that will be riding here!”