A Grimly Ghost, a Flight of the Heron fanfic

I. 'Crept in at My Bed-Foot...'

A fitful breeze was blowing against the canvas wall of the tent, pushing it in little billows towards the camp bed on which Keith Windham lay. Beyond the canvas was a dull reddish light, as unsteady as the wind—a fire lit somewhere in the camp; Keith himself had often formed one of the circle about such a fire, on a night such as this—and the measured footsteps of the sentry going back and forth outside.

Impatiently Keith turned himself over again, away from the flickering light and the rippling canvas, pulling the blanket across his shoulder and up over his head. He closed his eyes with a sigh, wishing he could not still hear the wind or the footsteps—and wishing also that he could not still see, clear as if it was before his eyes, the horrible ghoulish smile with which Captain Greening had watched him being escorted from Lord Loudoun's tent under arrest earlier that evening. What had that man done to Ewen Cameron, that he had made that disclosure about Lochiel 'voluntarily'?

It was hopeless; he would get no sleep tonight!... A few minutes of this futile pretence, and then Keith flung the blanket down again and turned onto his back—

—and saw someone standing at the foot of his bed.

His first thought was that it was the sentry, having formed some suspicion of his charge and come into the tent to make certain that he was still there. But the figure stood still, staring at Keith where he lay, and as Keith stared back at him it was clear, even in the dim light, that this was not the rather dull-looking private whom Keith had seen outside the tent when he was brought there. And surely this man was wearing Highland dress?—not the hybrid uniform kilt of Loudoun's 64th, but the true belted plaid of the wild Highlander, and a very ragged specimen of it.

A sensation as of icy water swirling round him assailed Keith. He ought to call out to summon the sentry, or to warn someone—in fact, why had he not done so already? This man was an enemy; never mind why he was in Keith's tent, he ought not to be in the camp at all...

He could not call out. Several attempts, increasing in impatience and urgency, made this clear. Nor could he sit up in the bed; and now he remembered that even if he could do that much, he had no sword any longer—there was nothing with which to defend himself.

But the man did not attack Keith; he only stood there. One side of his figure was illuminated weirdly by the faint, moving firelight, which cast dark shadows upon a face twisted in an expression of unspeakable hatred. The colours of his plaid were indistinct in the dimness, and would surely not have been very bright even under the clearest daylight, but as Keith continued to stare at him, the pattern resolved itself into a familiar one. It was the Cameron tartan.

And then a more powerful movement of the distant firelight, combined with a motion of the canvas which diffused it through the tent, showed Keith the other side of the man's face; and it was as though the icy water froze solid round his heart. The tartan ought to have warned him, for he had seen that face once already to-day—or rather, seen what his own pistol-shot had done to it.

Before he had time for any further thought, the man—the apparition—whatever it was—leaned slightly towards him, though he still did not step any closer, and began to speak. At first Keith could not make out the words at all, for they were spoken indistinctly, and in a weird voice which had more in common with the whistling of wild birds or the chittering of bats than with human speech. But it seemed that the man was asking him a question. He strained his muscles in another horrible, fruitless attempt to sit up, or at least to lean upwards, that he might hear what was being asked of him, but he still could not move. Then, for a few moments, he thought some words became distinguishable—but there was no sense in them. He caught the words 'bed-making', and then, 'Ach, Major Windham, after what you have done!—how do you like...'

But why was the apparition asking him about his bed-linen? The man was an enemy; surely he was going to attack Keith; oh, this was impossible—he must get up...

The movement Keith made was confused by the sudden exertion of strength where none had been before; he flung out one arm wildly, and narrowly avoided falling over the side of the bed. Hastily he righted himself and sat up, breathing heavily and staring into the half-darkness before him.

The figure was gone.

Keith woke from a deep sleep to the sound of the bugle, that familiar cock-crow of the army camp, and took a few moments to remember where he was and why he had come there. Intruding itself past those recollections which might have made sense of his current position was the memory, stark and strange, of the horrible nightmare he had had. There had been something in the tent with him, or rather many somethings—he believed it had been a herd of swine, as wild and violent as the Gadarene beasts—and the place had been full of blood; so much blood that the bed had seemed to float in it...

Determinedly, he swung his legs over the side of the bed—which stood firmly upon the floor of the tent, without so much as a stain upon it—and looked about for his clothes. Major Windham did not often remember his dreams, and he was not given to dwelling much upon them when he did. This one was strangely persistent in his thoughts; but as he dressed himself, more immediate things returned with greater strength to his mind. He remembered his confrontation with Lord Loudoun, and he remembered Captain Greening... There were enough horrors in the waking world, without brooding upon nightmares.

And for the rest of that day he thought only of Ardroy. By the time he left the tent in the evening, he scarcely remembered the dream at all.

The strip of sky which showed through the narrow window was dark, though the day did not seem long gone. A star twinkled, very far away, and a wisp of cloud, a more solid darkness than the black sky, moved slowly across the window. Presently the star was gone—hidden by the cloud, or carried in its motion beyond the circumscribed view from the window, Ewen did not know.

Such senseless pieces of observation were all that was in his mind. His heart was broken, and he had no strength for anything else. Dully he remembered Captain Greening, gloatingly triumphant, reading out to him those hideous words which he had spoken, all unknowing, and so betrayed his Chief. What use were any other thoughts—what use was anything else in the world, when he had done that?... Yet no; sometimes he thought of one other thing: the betrayal—of far less enormity than his own, and yet how bitter it was to think of it—which had brought him here. Perhaps Major Windham had by now been told of Ewen's disclosure; surely he would be satisfied.

The wind was picking up; it made a soft, sad noise as it blew against the three windows and round the inadequate canvas cover of the breach in the wall on the other side of the room. It might have been raining; perhaps the rain was blowing in through the breach and freezing Ewen to death; he would not know, or care. From time to time his eyes would close for a while, but he did not sleep. Pulling himself up a little way against the side of the stone bench, he laughed at the horrible irony of that—a laugh which lasted only a moment before it threatened to turn to wild and bitter tears. His injured leg, which had been hurting dully and monotonously all day, now protested more sharply at the sudden movement, and this pulled him up short. The unsteady laugh was lost in a gasp of pain—after which he took a slow breath, steadied himself against the bench and fixed his gaze again upon the window, where two or three dim stars were now visible.

And there he remained for another uncounted stretch of time. The pain in his leg came and went. The view from the window was an uncanny one: from time to time other scenes, very different from that of the night sky outside, seemed to cross it, and Ewen squinted at them in some confusion. At one time he saw the house of Ardroy, and the lovely blue surface of Loch na h-Iolaire in the sunshine, and Aunt Margaret walking outside the house, searching for him—for he had got lost amongst the heather again, out playing all afternoon and losing track of time, and she did worry so. But it was hateful to see such dear, simple things, when he was an unforgiveable traitor and could never go back to them... And here was Lachlan MacMartin, coming towards him—faithful Lachlan, returned too late from his search for food; he would not find him. But what was Lachlan wearing? A long white garment was twisting itself about his legs as he walked, moving higher and obscuring more and more of his figure; and Ewen, watching, realised dimly that it was his winding-sheet.

Had his spirit come here to reproach Ewen? For he had been loyal to Ewen as Ewen had not been to Lochiel... At last the white folds wound about his head, cutting off whatever he had been trying to say to Ewen, and then his figure seemed to recede into the background for a while.

And some time later there was another figure, in a red coat, very bright against that dark sky, and with a little shock of repulsion Ewen recognised Major Windham. He was looking away from Ewen, and had laid his hand upon the white folds of Lachlan's shroud—but later on it seemed that Lachlan turned and followed him, saying something indistinct to Ewen as he did so.

After that there were only the stars and the clouds, and the anguish which—though its aspect changed with the passing hours of the night, now a sharp grief and now a dull, insistent ache—would not leave him. He did not think very much about the things he had seen. They seemed far away; indeed, everything did in this nightmare of a world, in which he was a traitor and Lochiel would soon be captured because of what he had done, and in which the treasure of Keith Windham's miraculous kindness was in the end no such thing, but only another and a more devastating cruelty. The sky outside the window turned to dawn, and then to day, and still he did not sleep.

A cold wind was blowing in over the grey water of the Moray Firth, but the clouds above it hung dark and unmoved beneath the sky. Corporal Thomas O'Leary of Blakeney's regiment, currently on guard duty outside the camp—which, accommodating those men of the regiments occupying Inverness who could not be quartered in the town itself, had been made amongst the wreckage to which the Jacobites had lately reduced Fort George—marvelled to himself as he walked at the thought that it was summer. What hateful weather! He adjusted the fastenings of his red coat in a vain attempt to keep out the wind, and went on pacing his route round the outskirts of the town.

It was certainly not work to warm the blood of a young soldier—not what the recruiting sergeant, all the way back home a long year ago, had promised Thomas and the three friends, all lads from the same village, with whom he had enlisted. And yet perhaps, he reflected, he had the best of it out here, for the work to be done in the town just at the moment was not at all to his taste. Corporal O'Leary was as keen on a proper fight as any young man in his position; the ignominious day of Falkirk Muir had nevertheless held its satisfactions for him, as had the action at Culloden, for a while; but, as he saw it, the violence of battle was one thing, and the slow, sustained and merciless cruelty which with the prisoners at Inverness had been treated since the battle was quite another, and not something he had any stomach for. But it was orders; it was the same for all the men of the two regiments stationed here. What could he do?

These dispiriting thoughts were doing little to improve his mood, and still the wind was blowing, and it was growing darker—if it was possible to believe there was a sun somewhere up there, then it must be setting. O'Leary's thoughts began to turn to the end of his shift on guard duty, and the supper which would follow it.

But here was something!—or, rather, someone, coming along the road towards the camp. It was a ragged-looking Highlander, walking with his head bent against the wind.

'Halt!' cried Corporal O'Leary as the man approached him. 'Who goes there?'

The Highlander, now only a few paces in front of him, looked up. Thomas fairly flinched at the sight of his face—dear God, how had he come by that? Perhaps he had been in the battle; but it looked fresh...

'I have business at the garrison,' said the man.

Or, as far as Thomas could make out, that was what he said, his voice was so strange—all whistling like a bird. Perhaps it, too, had been hurt—but Thomas abandoned these speculations and replied, 'Oh, yes? What business would that be, then?'

The Highlander glowered at him. Thomas recognised the tartan of the plaid which flapped about his thin legs in the wind—though it was badly stained with blood; there must be another wound in his side—for he had seen it on some of the prisoners in the town. The man was from a Jacobite clan, then—it was hard to see how he could have any legitimate business with the regiments here. 'There is an officer at Inverness. I must see him.'

'An officer?' This was even more doubtful. 'What's his name?'

'Major Keith Windham,' said the Highlander in his odd chittering voice.

Thomas recognised the name, for Major Windham had been the subject of some recent gossip amongst the private soldiers of Blakeney's and Battereau's regiments. The Major's official place was in the Royal Scots, but he was attached to Battereau's at present, apparently because of some scandal, or at least some serious irregularity, in which he had been involved a month or two ago. Still, that did not explain why such a man as this, and one probably from a Jacobite clan, should want to see him.

'I don't believe you,' said Thomas, and as the man opened his mouth to object, continued, 'I shall send your name up to the officers' quarters in the town, and if the Major says he knows you, then I suppose you may see him. But I don't expect he will.'

This was greeted with glowering silence.

'Your name?' prompted Thomas. More silence. 'Well, then.'

He supposed he ought to place the man, who was acting suspiciously if ever a Highlander did, under arrest; but he had foiled his plan of getting into the town, if that was what it had been, and surely such a poor-looking body as this was no great threat to the military establishment. Other considerations influenced him also; for it would, he thought to himself, be a downright shame to consign a man so sorely injured as this to the treatment received by the injured prisoners...

'Look here, man,' said Thomas suddenly. 'I don't know what you wanted with Major Windham, but—your head—can't I help you?' He had a clean handkerchief in his pocket; that would surely not be enough, but it might help, and he felt more and more that he must do something for this strange visitor.

The Highlander frowned at the handkerchief as Thomas began to pull it out, but in response to Thomas's questioning look he nodded, and allowed the soldier to bind it rather clumsily round his head.

Thomas stepped back to inspect his handiwork. It was rough—sure, he was no surgeon!—but it would do. Something struck him as strange, however—with the state the man's head was in, he should have thought it would be bleeding through the cloth in a few moments, but there was no stain of blood anywhere upon it, none at all.

It was strange, too, how cold he had felt, when Thomas was standing next to him and touching his head. It was not just the cold imparted from outside by the wind; there had seemed no warmth in him at all.

And all at once a certainty came to Thomas—it had been gradually forming throughout the last few minutes, but it now presented itself to him with sudden cold clarity—that there was something far stranger going on than an unaccountable request by a poor rebel Highlander to speak to a senior officer.

But at this point the man turned abruptly away and plodded off down the road away from the town—taking Thomas's handkerchief with him—and within a few minutes was out of sight.

The next morning over breakfast O'Leary told the story of his previous day's adventure to Ted Flanagan, the friend with whom he shared his lodgings in the town. His night's sleep had refreshed him, and together with the cheerful company of his fellows had brought him back firmly into a world of which he had, for a few moments yesterday, seemed dangerously near the edge. Now he was inclined to see the whole thing as rather a good joke than anything else.

Flanagan, however, listened to the tale with wide eyes, and when it was finished, gave a long and low whistle. ''Tis true, then,' he said at last.

'What's true?' demanded Thomas.

'The ghost,' said Flanagan, and, raising his hands defensively as Thomas made as if to object, continued, 'I have heard—I mean, not but what I don't listen to such silly tales, but 'tis what some of the men are saying—that there is a ghost, with an awful wound in his head like you saw, who walks the roads outside the town and tries to get in. And always, they say, he's asking for Major Windham.' He lowered his voice, intent on giving the appropriate atmosphere of drama to his words. 'They say 'tis the wraith of a man killed by the Major upon Drumossie Moor—after the battle.'

'Nonsense, Ted!' cried O'Leary. 'I don't believe it. 'Tis a coincidence.'

Ted shrugged. 'It is only what they're saying.'

Thomas finished his porridge in silence. The world of the busy town and of his familiar routine in the regiment—that world of reassuring normality—was all at once no longer so firm underfoot.

That day Thomas was not stationed outside the encampment again, but set to guard the prisoners in the tollbooth; and, distasteful as this work might be, he was not a little relieved at the change. But the image of the man he had met would follow him in his mind, as though it were itself a ghost and were haunting him now; and the sight and sound of the unfortunate prisoners combined itself with the memory of the stranger and with Flanagan's story about the supposed ghost's history, in reflections less comforting yet, until Thomas began to feel that he had not escaped from anything, after all.

II. A Strange Encounter

At daybreak on the twenty-sixth of July Keith Windham set off from Fort Augustus for the coast, at the head of the hundred men promised him by Lord Albemarle. The Highland weather chose that day to play another of its capricious tricks upon them: the day before had been one of brilliant sunshine, and the first few miles of their journey were made amidst a sunrise which gave every promise of equal endurance, but by mid-morning soft, curling clouds were beginning to make their way down the mountainsides bordering the Great Glen—as though the elephants to which Keith had once mentally compared those mountains were warming themselves in white blankets—and the further distances of the prospect before the soldiers' view were gradually hidden beneath the advancing mist.

Luckily Major Windham knew the way well; indeed, he knew it only too well, for this was the road along which his company had marched on the day of the ambush at High Bridge, nearly a year ago. He could only hope that the men under his command now would prove more courageous and better disciplined.

In the afternoon they crossed the bridge—without incident; it was a different place now—and made a halt at the change-house on the far side. As Keith swung off his horse, he heard the sound of cows lowing somewhere further along the road to the south, followed by a distant shouted instruction in what sounded very much like a northern English accent; this puzzled him for a moment, before he remembered what he had lately heard about farmers from England coming into the Highlands to purchase the cattle confiscated from the rebels. Evidently a party of these far-roaming drovers had been at the change-house before them. Keith looked down the road, where the indistinct black forms of the hindmost few beasts were still just visible. The commonplace sounds of cattle and drovers were made oddly eerie by their passage through the mist, becoming, as they did, messages from what could not be seen.

But the lowing, becoming more distant every minute, was soon drowned out entirely by the soldiers' conversation and laughter, the clinking of their chopins as they obtained refreshment from the change-house, the calls of the swallows going back and forth to their nests in the house's roof and other such more immediate noises. Keith, having eaten a hunk of bread and cheese and satisfied himself that his men were behaving themselves, gave instructions to a lieutenant to keep an eye on them and on his horse and wandered away from the assembled company, heading down towards the river. He wanted quieter surroundings in which to think over his plans for the work that lay before him; after so much of that inaction which was so galling to his spirit, the sudden prospect of being responsible for the successful capture of the Pretender's son had animated his military instincts wonderfully, and already he was beginning mentally to sketch out plans for how he might best dispose his men in order to achieve his aim.

Absorbed in these all-important thoughts he walked slowly along a track that led away from the main road, while the sounds of the soldiers at the change-house faded into the mist and those of the rushing river far below gradually impinged themselves upon his consciousness; and perhaps it was because he was so absorbed that he did not see the man standing against an oak tree at the top of the steep riverbank until he was within a few paces of him. But perhaps not; Keith, rapidly overcoming the shock of sudden perception, noticed how still the man stood, and how the colours of his dirty and bloodstained plaid (the Cameron tartan, Keith realised with a little pang; how often must he see it in these unhappy days!...) blended against those of the oak and of the bracken and briars growing round it. And the mist, of course, concealed everything quite as effectually as any deliberate disguise.

Was this person any threat? Surely not, for it would be a foolish place to plan an attack.

The man's face was all but hidden by a fold of his plaid and by his untidy black hair; even so, Keith had a sudden strange feeling that he had seen him somewhere before.

Perhaps, thought Keith, it would after all be wiser to stay with his men. He was turning to go back the way he had come when the strange man said distinctly, 'Major Windham?'

Keith started. The voice was peculiar, in more than its pronounced Gaelic accent—it seemed akin to those of the swallows at the change-house, having the same quality of rapid, dry twittering. And how did he know who Keith was? But very quickly the explanation came to him: this man was a Cameron; the people at the change-house were Camerons; he must be a servant of the house, and he had seen Keith and his men arrive. Keith dismissed the odd feeling of something wrong which had been picking at his mind ever since he first saw the man, and said, 'Yes; has your master a message for me?' For this seemed the most likely reason for the servant's wanting to speak to him. He could still faintly hear the sound of his men's voices behind him, but it was possible that something had gone amiss with them and that the keeper of the change-house wished to make him aware of it, or that he had some other question which required Keith's attention.

The servant turned his head to the side, as though considering the question, and took a step or two forward from his station against the tree. Then he said, 'That is right. I will bring you to him, sir. You must follow me.'

And he set off along the bank.

There was a rough track winding through the scrub and bracken, but it was not easy going. Thin, wiry briars caught at Keith's clothes and hands, clinging with tenacious thorns and sprinkling him with the drops of water which the mist had strewn over them. Below him, beyond the screening growth of birches and alders and the thick clouds of mist which had settled themselves in the depths of the ravine, ran the Spean in its narrow bed; its roaring grew yet louder, drowning out the sounds of the soldiers' voices as they receded into the distance.

Abruptly Keith stopped. 'This is not the way back to the change-house!' he said. 'There has been some mistake. Where do you mean to lead me?'

The servant, who was walking some paces ahead of him, turned back. 'There is no mistake, sir,' he said, with a deferential bow of the head. 'It is this way—the change-house. You must follow me.'

Keith shook his head, and his right hand closed over the pistol in its holster at his side. He had been foolish to follow the man even this far, for the way was certainly not leading to the change-house, nor to any other place where there might conceivably be a message for him. This was some trick. He ought to have remembered that the country was full of enemies, and surely some of them had at their command methods more subtle than the simple violence which another unfortunate Highlander had tried to use against him by Loch Tarff a few months ago.

'Where do you mean to lead me?' he said again—to gain time, for this man would certainly lead him no farther. Yet Keith could not shoot him when he was unarmed—or, at least, appeared to be—and had as yet done nothing overtly hostile. Was it safe simply to turn and run? Or might there be some concealed threat—friends with weapons of their own, waiting amongst the trees in the mist...?

The man turned round and walked a little way back towards him, as if he meant to continue his attempts at persuading Keith to keep following him; but, in doing so, he let the folded hood of his plaid fall away from his face—and Keith saw what he had been hiding, and knew where he had seen him before, and the blood froze in his veins.

His memory of Loch Tarff had been more to the purpose than he knew; for, however impossible it might be, it was the same man. The assassin of Loch Tarff stood before him again.

The shock must have shown on his countenance; for, in looking at him, that half of the man's face which was capable of forming expressions lost the last vestiges of the look of guilelessness with which he had been trying to regain Keith's trust. Now it changed to an expression of utter hatred, full at once of wild madness and intent ferocity.

'I shall lead you to hell!' he snarled, and raised his hands above him—

—and the earth beneath Keith's feet began to crumble away. It was only a little movement at first, the floor of moss and leaf litter shifting slightly as the soil below it disappeared; but this lasted only for a moment, and long before Keith could react—almost before he was aware of what was happening—his feet lost their purchase on solid ground entirely. Trees, bushes and riverbank lurched away above him as he fell. Stones and clods of earth which a few moments before had been solid ground skipped and danced down towards the water below. His arms flailed wildly, seeking desperately for something to catch hold of, and found only empty air, cool and clammy with the mist and pitiless in its grey insubstantiality.

He knocked into something hard and rough, jarring his chin against it. His head swam; and it was only after a few moments that he became aware that his arms had, by unthinking instinct, closed round the object, and that he had stopped falling. It was the trunk of a tree—a rowan growing tenaciously and almost horizontally out of the steep and rocky bank, as rowan will. Breathing heavily, fighting to overcome the shock of the fall, Keith managed to swing his legs up and clamber into a more comfortable position between the trunk and the rocks above it. The grey bark was damp beneath his fingers; a few yards to his right, thick clusters of red berries hung amongst the leaves where they drooped out over the ravine.

Keith looked up. He had not fallen very far, after all, and his limbs all seemed to be intact; he ought to be able to climb back up to the path. But perhaps it would be wiser to stay here for a while and let his assailant—of whom there was no sign at present—continue to believe, as he evidently did now, that the push he had given Keith had achieved its purpose (for he had pushed Keith off the top of the bank; surely he had; that was the only explanation...).

While he sat there, thinking over how long he ought to wait, he happened to glance down—and saw, in a gap which had opened for a moment between the moving clouds and coils of the mist, the Spean rushing in its bed below him. This part of the bank was so steep that it was almost vertical. Had it not been for the rowan, he would certainly have gone down there into the water.

He was still feeling a little shaken when, at length, and with his pistol at the ready, he regained the path. But there was still no sight or sound of the man who had attacked him, and he set off at a brisk jog back towards the change-house—pausing only for a moment when he noticed the spot where he had been standing just before the attack. Beneath the overhanging branches was a scraped-out patch of bare muddy earth, sloping down towards the river, as though there had been a small landslide.

'Thank you, Carter,' he said to the lieutenant in charge of his horse when he returned. He looked round at the gathered men. 'We shall set off now; we must make haste if we are to reach Fort William in good time.'

'Yes, sir,' said Carter, and then, 'Forgive me, sir, but—are you quite well? You look—'

He hesitated, as though uncertain exactly what in Major Windham's appearance had roused his concern. But doubtless Keith was a little unwontedly mud-stained; and perhaps it was as well to apprise his lieutenant somewhat of the dangers they all faced. Certainly it would not do to keep the story back purely out of shame that he had been foolish enough to allow his unknown enemy an opportunity. He beckoned Carter nearer and said in a low voice, 'A Highlander tried to attack me on the path down there. Oh, there is no harm done—'twas not a serious attempt, and I got easily away, as you see. But we must be on our guard, Carter; this country is full of enemies. No one must be allowed to wander away from the company.'

'Understood, sir,' said Lieutenant Carter, wide-eyed. 'I say—I don't suppose you've heard, but the people at the change-house have been telling us about a rebel prisoner who escaped from a party of Kingston's Horse as they were escorting him across the river here yesterday. Quite a dramatic story—the men are all talking of it. He is supposed to be very fearsome and desperate, and no one knows where he has gone. Perhaps it was he who attacked you?'

'No, I shouldn't think—' began Keith, and then a thought struck him—an incredibly welcome thought, which brought such hope and amazement into his heart as to drive entirely out the lingering shock and unease of his recent experiences. Keeping his countenance carefully neutral, he said, 'Could that have been the prisoner who was brought away from Fort Augustus just before we set out—Cameron of Ardroy? I believe 'twas a party of Kingston's Horse who were sent with him, and they must have passed this way, for they were bound for Fort William.'

'Cameron of Ardroy—yes, that was the name,' said Carter. 'How unfortunate that he has escaped! I believe he was supposed to be a person of some importance.'

Keith's heart gave a great leap. Ewen had escaped! So he would not end upon Carlisle gate, and Keith's efforts on his behalf would not, after all, have been in vain. He was incredibly cheered to know it; it was as though a clogging mist, far thicker and darker than the physical clouds hanging over the land to-day, had been lifted from his heart, and the sun—that sun which had been such an unwonted sight in those places until very recently—shone again, warm and brave. Ewen must know the country round here well; it sounded as though he had thoroughly given his captors the slip, and probably by now he was on his way back to Ardroy—perhaps he had reached it already, and was safe in hiding there, in his own house, or up amongst the heather above the loch. If only his wound did not disable him too sorely... But of these thoughts Keith must show no sign. 'Yes,' he said, somewhat distractedly, 'he is a cousin to Lochiel... But I know him by sight, and 'twas not he who attacked me. But come; we must be on our way.'

Carter agreed promptly, and they set about their preparations. Ten minutes later the company were on their westward road once more, amongst a mist which, still stubbornly persisting, clung to the men's clothes and to the horses' hair in cool, damp, quicksilver droplets as they marched along.

Keith rode at the head of the column with a mind in some turmoil. It was his duty to think first of the plans for their journey, that he might do everything necessary for their smooth arrival in Moidart, and he endeavoured to do so. But inevitably intermixed with thoughts of their reception at Fort William, and of the Navy ship which was to carry them further up the coast to the remote neighbourhood of Loch nan Uamh and Morar, were thoughts of Ewen. His mind ran on ahead of itself, as the mind will in contemplation of unknown but vitally dear facts, and presented to him a hundred speculative images of where Ewen might now be and how he might be faring. He remembered the prophecy made by Ewen's foster-father the seer, telling of how he and Ewen were to meet five times; yet if Ewen survived after all, as he surely would do now that he was free, they might meet again in the future, enemies no longer. They might be friends, as he had imagined they could have been during his last solemn conversation with Ewen. His speculations about the future extended further, and he saw that happy future time—distant yet now, it seemed, within reach—and Ewen's handsome, smiling face and deep blue eyes before him again...

He was not troubled by any thought of its being improper to feel such happiness at the news of an important enemy's escape. Ewen had not escaped from his keeping, and he had no obligation to do anything about the situation; and a mere feeling could hardly be contrary to his duty. So he was happy.

And yet again, welling up from beneath these other thoughts like a current from strange, deep waters, there was the memory of his recent unnerving experience; and the image of the overgrown track above the Spean returned to him. He was now inclining to the conclusion that, after all, it had not been the same man who had attacked him at Loch Tarff. That incident had made a deep impression upon his mind; it was natural that, on seeing another man with an injury very like the one which he had inflicted upon the would-be assassin of Loch Tarff, in somewhat similar circumstances, he should think of it again and confuse the two persons. But that man had been killed, by Mackay's dirk if not by Keith's pistol; of that there had been no doubt whatever. Besides, this man's wound had appeared quite fresh; and more than one desperate vagabond was assuredly going about the Highlands in these days who wore the Cameron tartan. Yes, probably he had been shot in some encounter with the soldiers still occupied in inflicting their awful revenge on their defeated enemies, and had, in a fit of madness, attacked the next redcoat he saw.

But the image of the man with his hands raised, cursing Keith to hell, would bring itself again to his mind's view; as would the memory of that patch of bare ground, rough and clean as though some great hand had scraped plants, stones and soil off over the bank—and of the stones and clods of earth falling down into the river.

Major Windham shook his head impatiently, and returned to the present and to the column of men marching before him. This detestable country was affecting his mind... They were making good progress, and the horrible mist was at last beginning to clear. Perhaps they would even see the sun before they reached Fort William. And then Moidart, and the greatest mission and the greatest responsibility which he had had in all these long dreary months in Scotland. He would require all his powers of planning and considered action if he was to succeed; and he resolved to concentrate his attention entirely on the efforts which would bring that success.

The wind was blowing over the heather, lifting the tough brown branches and the delicate new blossoms, now brushing them gently forward, now pushing roughly at them as a sudden gust swept down the brae. A few fitful drops of rain blew in on the wind. He knew these slopes and this heather and this rain, for he had walked upon these hills many a time, hunting the deer or carrying messages or travelling back and forth to his old home. It was very strange now that he could not feel the wind or the rain.

He knew now that his attempt by Spean side had failed; he had still achieved no more than on that first night when, bewildered by the events of the day and the new state in which he found himself, and with his sustaining rage and hatred against Major Windham the only clear thing in his mind, he had been able to show himself in image to the Major, but not to do anything to him. Major Windham still lived, and had gone to the west coast to watch for Prince Tearlach; and so he was going to the coast too, to find the redcoat there and kill him at last. But he was not always walking the ways that led to Moidart. Sometimes he returned up here, to the old hills above the glen of Ardroy where he and Mac 'ic Ailein had roamed together in the old days. Sometimes he was at Slochd nan Eun with his father, who was ill and full of grief, and then Lachlan would try to do what he could for him, putting more peats on the fire when he seemed to suffer from the cold, and speaking to him of things that might cheer him. His father could see him sometimes, and they spoke together. The old man had been unhappy, at first, to see his son lingering in this world, for he said—with the authority of one who knows such things—that it was not good so to remain; but Lachlan had told him of his quest, and then he had agreed that he must have vengeance upon the redcoat officer who had betrayed Mac 'ic Ailein. He had prayed to God to lend strength to Lachlan's arm and victory to his purpose.

Perhaps God would listen to such a prayer, or perhaps He would not. Lachlan could see, at times, something of that place where he ought to have gone when he died amongst the heather by Loch Tarff, and whither the Lord was calling him still. There was—it seemed to him—a birk growing upon a high hill, more green than any tree that ever grew on earth; and Neil was gone there, and was grieved that his brother did not follow him, and called to him also. But he could not go—not yet. Perhaps God would be wrathful because he refused to go when he was called; but it could not be helped, for the loyalty and the duty which kept him here must be answered first. Even if that bright vision of the birk tree was cut off from him for ever, and he was instead cast down into hell for his disobedience, Mac 'ic Ailein would be avenged. That was all that mattered—and it was all he could give, after he had left Ewen in the hut upon Beinn Laoigh and allowed the false Major and the redcoats to get to him. That shame burned in his soul, a hot agony, ever-present, and he could not show himself to Mac 'ic Ailein any more. But it would be put right...

The rain was falling harder now, soaking into the dark, peaty ground beneath the heather, running down in unseen channels beneath the earth. It was growing dark. Strange that he did not shiver in the cold of evening. He went out in his thought, and saw Major Windham seeking the Prince in Moidart. There he stood, proud and contemptuous as he had been when Ewen had first brought him to Ardroy a year ago—a false snake, hiding his treacherous purposes beneath that appearance of honour and gentlemanliness which had so pleased Mac 'ic Ailein, that he had brought him, an enemy, to eat at his own table and given him a bed in his house... Oh, would that he had succeeded in throwing the redcoat into the loch, that day when he came to Slochd nan Eun! So much grief would have been averted, and Mac 'ic Ailein would not have been taken captive through his betrayal. He would have been angry with Lachlan, sorely angry, but that meant nothing, if he was only alive and safe. But no matter; all was as it must be, as his father said, and he would find a way to come to where the Major was and kill him. Then Ewen would be avenged. Then he could rest...

The wraith of Lachlan MacMartin turned and walked down the dark hillside, the driving rain falling all about him.

III. The Peats on the Fire

'But I fear that Lachlan is dead, foster-father,' repeated Ewen, kneeling on one knee beside him. The fire crackled softly in the dark little room; Angus's blind gaze did not move from it. 'Is it not his wraith that puts the peats on the fire for you?'

He said it merely to indulge the old man; his foster-father's mind was wandering in the strange paths of old age and illness, and confusing the seeings of this world with those of the other as he drew yet closer to it, and it was surely better not to contradict him in the conclusions he reached, but to meet him with patient compassion. And old Angus nodded slowly, in apparent agreement. Ewen recalled what Mairi, the unmarried daughter who cared for Angus, had told him when he had last spoken to her: 'He is confused... Sometimes he does not know me—he thinks I am my mother, or his sister who died when a child, or my poor little brother. He seems often to think that Lachlan is here.'

But at that moment, as though in answer to Ewen's words, a sudden cold draught blew through the cottage. Ewen glanced up at the outside door, which he had left standing half-open to the warm August afternoon; as he looked, it swung on its creaking hinges, slowly back and forth.

Ewen began to get to his feet, thinking to go and close the door against the draught. As he did so he looked back into the further corner of the room, and saw his foster-brother standing on the other side of the fire.

'Lachlan!' he said in breathless amazement. At his side Angus smiled contentedly and raised a hand in welcome to his son. So Angus had been right, after all: Lachlan still lived, and had returned to him. Ewen stood up and went as if to greet his foster-brother.

'Mac 'ic Ailein,' said Lachlan. 'I cannot—no, come no closer!'

Ewen started back in dismay, as much at the sound of the words as at the words themselves, for Lachlan's voice was not his own; it was a horrible, harsh chattering sound like the voices of the bats which roosted beneath the shelter of the creag ruadh. Its tone, so far as it had one, was full of dismay.

'Lachlan, what is wrong?' said Ewen.

He still could not see Lachlan clearly amidst the smoke which rose from the fire between them, but he saw something of the look of anguish with which his foster-brother turned away from him. In bewildered impatience Ewen crossed round the fire and went up to him; Lachlan made as if to shrink from him, but Ewen grasped hold of his wrist.

'Lachlan, I had thought you were dead,' he said. 'It is a joy to me to see you again! Tell me now, what is wrong?'

For surely something was wrong; and, as he stood there, watching the look of terror and shame in the dark eyes as they met his own, Ewen began to have some vague idea of what. Lachlan's skin was quite cold beneath his hand—cold as the clay, or as the sodden peat of the high moors. With the hold he had upon him, Ewen ought to have been able to feel the pulse in his wrist, but there was none. And, as Lachlan turned his head in the dim firelight, Ewen saw with dismay the terrible wreck that was the far side of his face—not the scars of an old wound, but quite a fresh one, fresh enough that it ought to have been bleeding.

But Lachlan himself was caught in a different agony. 'Mac 'ic Ailein, dear of my heart,' he said, 'it was because of me that the saighdearan dearg captured you.' The weird voice now took on a tone which Ewen knew quite well. 'I should not have left you. I failed you—I cannot face you! Let me go.'

'All is well, Lachlan,' said Ewen impatiently; without conscious effort, the familiar tone brought out a familiar response in him, and the rising horror of his other ideas was subdued for a moment. 'You see, I have escaped; and you and I have both come back here. You must—'

'No, no,' said Lachlan; and with a half-sobbing cry, he pulled his arm free from his foster-brother's grasp and turned away into the smoky darkness. Ewen tried to follow after him... and then there was only the smoke, rising in dark, rich-smelling coils from the peats.

There was a silence of several minutes.

At last old Angus spoke. 'So you see him too,' he said quietly. 'You have a little of the sight yourself, my dear one; I have often observed it. And he is your foster-brother.'

Ewen was staring at the place where Lachlan had been, and where there were now only wisps of smoke curling gently against the dark cottage wall.

'He has often returned to me,' went on Angus, unperturbed, 'but he has a task of great import to do, which keeps him from me—and it keeps him from you too, my darling treasure, though I am grieved to see it. For he has sworn the holy oath to be avenged on the man who betrayed you to the saighdearan dearg—the English officer who was your guest, and who found you in the bothy on Beinn Laoigh, and delivered you up, and told the soldiers who you were. Oh, to think that I never saw that betrayal, when I saw how the heron would bring him to you! Lachlan has not got vengeance on him yet, but may his quest meet with swift success!'

Ewen knelt on the floor again beside Angus, ignoring the protests of his injured leg at the sudden motion. His heart was beating violently. 'Angus, what are you saying?' he said. 'Lachlan has sworn vengeance—but no, you are mistaken! Major Windham, the English officer you speak of, did not betray me. He saved my life; 'tis thanks to him that I am here now. Where has Lachlan gone?—I must find him and tell him of this awful mistake!'

Angus shook his head. 'He has gone where you cannot follow, Eoghain. But you say it is a mistake he has made? Lachlan told me he heard it from the soldiers' talk in the camp where you were taken, as he skulked round it in the dark. He stole a musket from one of the redcoats, and meant to lie in wait and shoot the Englishman as he returned over the Corryarrick pass. Ah, the soldier was too cunning for him, for it was he who shot poor Lachlan first. But Lachlan would not be turned from his purpose, even by death. He shall not rest while the Englishman lives.'

Ewen, listening, tried to calm the whirl of his brain sufficiently to take in the sense of what Angus was telling him. He saw how Lachlan had made this mistake, and saw too with dreadful clarity the determined loyalty with which Lachlan would pursue vengeance against a man whom he believed to have betrayed Ewen. But Lachlan was here now; he had just seen him! He could find him and tell him there was no need for vengeance.

With a brief word to Angus, Ewen sprang to his feet and ran out of the cottage, still not sparing his leg. Outside the sun was descending above the hills, touching the heather and rushes, the stones and scree and the walls of the clustered cottages of Slochd nan Eun with soft red gold. Mairi was speaking to another woman outside one of the cottages, a bucket of water standing on the ground by her feet; a group of children chased each other about in some game; somewhere in the golden sky above them all a lark was singing. Of Lachlan there was no sign.

In desperation, Ewen called his name aloud. The two women turned their heads at the shout, and the children ran giggling away.

He went over to Mairi. 'You must have seen Lachlan—he was here not five minutes ago. Where did he go?'

She looked bewildered. 'Lachlan has never been here, Mac 'ic Ailein. I believe he is dead, as I told you the other day.'

Ewen shook his head, and glanced about him like a man trapped and looking for a way of escape. High above the laverock continued its song, that steady rippling reel without halt or hesitation; the tiny burn that ran down by the cottages murmured over its stony bed, and the children, returned to their play, had waded into the shallow water and begun splashing each other industriously. Over all the sun shone. Such peaceful surroundings revived the rational mind, which now began to reassert itself after the strange dream of the cottage. Lachlan was not here; Ewen had not really seen him. Angus's words were full of confusion and dread—his uncanny talk of prophecies and wraiths and the other world had affected Ewen in this way once or twice before, when he was younger—and the close atmosphere of the cottage, with its smoky darkness, had strengthened the effect. No doubt he had thought he had seen something; perhaps it had been some vision conjured by Angus's second sight, or by the power of the old man's memory of his beloved son, but it had not been Lachlan. Probably Mairi was right, and he was dead; his apparent disappearance since May, when Windham's return over the Corryarrick, of which Angus had spoken, had taken place, pointed to that. So, whatever misapprehensions Lachlan had been under concerning Keith, he would never be able to keep that awful vow.

Ewen breathed deeply. The moment of terrible panicked dread was over; Windham, wherever he was, was safe. Already rather abashed at his own impetuous reaction, he apologised to Mairi with what grace he could muster, then returned into the cottage to speak to Angus once more. Although the threat now seemed quite illusory, he would take what precaution he could, and tell Angus that if Lachlan came to him again, he was to explain to him that Windham was not Ewen's enemy and that he must abandon his plan. And he would say goodbye to the old man, for he must leave him this evening, perhaps—given Angus's failing health; and he had seemed to think so himself—for ever.

A while later, Ewen returned down the path towards Loch na h-Iolaire in the brilliant sunset light; and yet it seemed to him that something was not right, or had not been worked out quite as it ought to have been, and in the warmth of the red-gold glow there was yet something horribly cold.

It was the morning of the next day, and Ewen and his three companions lay concealed in a little hollow of birch and alder scrub beside a burn. They had made good progress on their first night's journey; when darkness fell they would set out again, and if all went well they would be in Moidart the day after. And the day after that, perhaps, upon the sea... For now, Duncan sat watchful on guard beneath the rim of the hollow, and the rest of them were trying to get what sleep they could.

Ewen pulled his plaid up over his head and closed his eyes. The strange effort of sleeping in daylight was disturbing his rest, and his thoughts, it seemed, were likewise disturbed; he would keep thinking of Ardroy, as he had last seen it in the fading glow of the glorious sunset, and of the uncertain days and months—it might well be years—which lay ahead of him before he would see it again. The thought of going so long without a sight of the lovely water of Loch na h-Iolaire was a grievous one... And there returned to his mind also the memory of his visit to old Angus MacMartin, and the things Angus had told him, and the strange vision which he had seen of Lachlan. Where was Keith Windham now? Far away, somewhere in the sunset...

But it was not the sunset which shone upon his beloved loch now; it was the moon, clear and astonishingly bright upon the dark water, where the sparkling ripples of brilliant white narrowed and advanced away to the distant horizon. No, Loch na h-Iolaire was not so wide as that; this was the sea! Had they reached it already, then? He looked round for his companions. Yes, there was young Angus, standing a few paces away from him with the moonlight shining upon his dark hair. Ewen went to speak to him; the lad must not be so reckless, standing there in such a conspicuous spot, where the redcoat patrols out searching for the Prince and for any other Jacobite refugees they could find might see him.

Angus turned his head; and Ewen stopped dead in his tracks. For it was not Angus at all; the face which looked at him, its eyes burning bright with intent purpose, was Lachlan's—just as it had looked amidst the peat-smoke of old Angus's cottage, disfigured by the same terrible wound.

Ewen reached out his hand and tried to go to him. 'Lachlan—wait!'

Lachlan shook his head. His face was tragic. 'I must find him,' he said in his wraith's voice. 'He is here—the Major, the man who betrayed you. But, Mac 'ic Ailein, my own heart's life, I betrayed you! He could never have done it if not for me. I cannot face you until he is dead.'

And then Ewen saw, down below them, marching along a track which wound through the low scrub of hazel, birch and rowan growing above the shore, a line of redcoats. One of the patrols watching the coast for the Prince, as he had thought; but at the head of the patrol was a figure he knew. With the clarity of nightmare he saw the familiar sharp, handsome features outlined in the moonlight, the well-practised officer's bearing with which he walked, the red coat with the blue facings of the Royal Scots...

'He is here!' said Lachlan again.

All the terrible power in the wraith, of the soul's life which ought to have left this world long before and which, lingering, put its strength into strange and uncanny things, was bent with hatred upon the officer marching at the head of that patrol.

'I will be there soon,' he said, 'where he is, and then I shall slay him.'

Ewen's brain whirled. He must stop Lachlan—no, he must go to Windham and warn him of the danger! Lachlan, turning abruptly, set off at a run, and Ewen tried to follow him, to reach Windham before he did; but he could not move, for his leg hurt him and the damaged muscle would not obey his commands.

'No,' he gasped, as Lachlan disappeared into the night. It seemed that Windham was only a little way from him now; if he exerted all his effort, he might reach him in time. He must reach him. 'Windham,' he said, 'you must—you are in terrible danger—'

But Windham went on marching along, unmoved.

'No, you must hear me,' said Ewen desperately. 'You must—Keith!'

His outstretched hand closed upon empty air; and then the moonlit coast disappeared, and Ewen woke in the quiet daylight of the scrubby hollow.

After the following few moments of confusion, the first sight of which he was clearly aware was that of young Angus's face—his own face now, not his uncle's—watching him with a look of terrified concern. 'Are you well, Mac 'ic Ailein?' he whispered.

Ewen pulled himself into a sitting position. He was breathing as hard as if he had been running, his leg was furiously painful as it had not been for days past, and he had apparently managed to kick his plaid almost entirely away from his body.

'I—it was a nightmare,' he said with some difficulty, gathering up the folds of the plaid. 'Oh, I am sorry to have alarmed you, Angus Og! There is nothing the matter.'

And in a few minutes more Angus, satisfied that Ewen was not hurt and that there was no danger, had gone back to sleep, for there were still some hours to go before dusk. But Ewen did not sleep. He lay wrapped in the plaid, while the aspen leaves above him whispered in the breeze and a flock of linnets twittered to each other as they moved industriously through the bushes on the far side of the hollow, and the images of his dream turned themselves over and over in his mind, constantly reasserting themselves against the aspen and the linnets and all waking reality.

For it was quite plain that the vision of Lachlan which had appeared in his dream corresponded exactly with what Ewen thought he had seen of Lachlan in old Angus's cottage, and with what Angus himself had told him; and the dream itself had brought back all the dread and horror of those few moments in the cottage, in a greater strength which could not be so easily dismissed. Had it been merely a nightmare—his mind returning to the disconcerting memory of the vision in the peat-smoke and building new details upon it, as the sleeping mind sometimes will with what frightens and discomposes us? More and more it seemed to Ewen that it had not been. More images presented themselves to his mind, or were conjured there by his imagination: Lachlan, a year ago, shooting the heron that had lived on the island in Loch na h-Iolaire; Angus's prophecy that he and Keith Windham should meet five times, brought together by a heron, and his words yesterday of sorrow upon the white sands where Ewen was going; Windham himself, meeting with a sudden murderous attack as he rode over the Corryarrick, and defending himself as it would be only natural for him to do; Lachlan—his foster-brother, his own loyal, rebellious, tenacious Lachlan—finding the goal to which he had devoted himself for his beloved chieftain's sake taken from his grasp by death, and refusing to rest until he had taken it back...

And he also remembered Angus saying yesterday that he thought Ewen himself had a little of the second sight. Certainly Angus had sometimes seen things in dreams which were not only dreams—or at least had turned out later on to be uncannily close to reality.

The conviction which had so gripped him in the nightmare, that Keith was in terrible danger, unaware, and that he must warn him before it was too late, grew upon him again. It was intolerable. If only he could find Keith somehow, and discuss all these things with him, rationally and as friends, as they had discussed old Angus's prophecy; Keith would make sense of it all, and would reassure him, and he would be safe...

And then Ewen sat up with a start; for his dream had furnished him with one concrete fact which—he racked his brain to confirm his memory—had not come from old Angus, or from anything else in his knowledge: that Keith was on the coast where Ewen was going, in command of the soldiers guarding the shore against the Prince's escape, and that it was thither that Lachlan was now pursuing him. He might find Keith there, then, and speak to him!

And if Keith was indeed in Moidart, then one part of the dream, at least, would be proved true.

The next morning, amidst a white mist which did better than the darkness at concealing their progress from any enemies, they reached Morar, and found shelter in the cottage of a MacDonald fisherman who promised to take them out to the French ship that evening. While Duncan and Angus were eating the simple but generously-given supper of bread and herring prepared by the fisherman's wife, Ewen spoke to the fisherman himself.

'There is something else I wish to know about the redcoats in these parts,' he said, after a few questions about the dangers they must avoid on their way down to the sea. 'Do you know the name of the officer in command of them?'

'His name?' said the MacDonald, evidently surprised at Ewen's wishing to know such an irrelevant detail. 'Why, yes—'tis a Major Windham.'

IV. More Unreal in the Moonlight

The leaves of the little trees growing along the low ground above the shore were growing old, and in daylight they looked as leaves generally do by the middle of August: the rowans had lost their perfect pointed symmetry, the curling leaves of the oak were wizened and criss-crossed by the tracks of beetle larvae, the hazels were caterpillar-eaten and rough to the touch. But the moon is kinder than his stronger sister, and the gentle white light which he now cast upon the scene smoothed over and obscured all these earthly imperfections. The trees lost the raggedness of their months of life, and took on the appearance of ideal trees as seen in a dream. The dappled shadows beneath them might have been those cast by new leaves upon the flowers of May.

Out upon the water of the bay the French ship was lying, pale and shadowy, a ghostly ship upon a silent sea. On the shore the leaves rustled dreamily, as if the moon calmed the little breeze as it moved upon them. Between them lay the silver sands of Morar, and behind all rose the low, dark hills with the moonlight just brushing the heather of their tops.

It was a quiet scene, and it appeared deserted; but it was not quite so.

Lachlan had not returned to his father's house since he had met Ewen so unexpectedly there, for the meeting had been a shock and a grief to him. Not that it was not a joy to know that Mac 'ic Ailein was alive and had escaped from his captors; but that made no difference to what Lachlan had done—nor to what he must do—and he could not face his chieftain and foster-brother again with that awful weight still upon his soul. Indeed, it seemed sometimes that he could not visit and appear to his father any more as he had done; he had been months now in this existence, an unnatural and uncanny thing, and as time passed he was drawing further away from the image of reality and becoming more and more a creature of another world. Perhaps, in the end, the Sleagh Maidh would take him to their kingdom, if God would not to His. He walked where ghosts walk, between the quick and the dead; upon one side of him was the place where Major Windham lived, and upon the other the vast unknown chasm of infinity.

But he was every bit as bent upon his purpose as ever. And now there was a sound amidst the stillness—the soft beat of a horse's hoofs upon the sandy surface of the track beneath the trees. Major Windham was here.

Keith Windham reined in his horse and sat for a moment looking out over the white sand and the silver water. The tide was drawing in, moving rapidly but as noiselessly as everything else in this deserted place; there was no sound nor sight of the patrol who should be coming from their quarters on the other side of the bay, across the river; and all the while that French ship floated upon the sea, waiting ready to carry off any fugitives who might care to make their attempt at escape!

Then he saw a dark shape down on the white sand: a little boat, which—without any means of securing it in place, and with the tide fast approaching—had surely been left there for some other purpose than fishing. Keith dismounted, threw the bridle over the branch of one of the low trees, and stepped down onto the sand to inspect the boat.

And Lachlan followed him. He walked silently and without time or distance through the air and over the silver ground; and so it was only when Keith turned to go back to his horse that he saw his pursuer for the first time—something which was now certainly not a living man, the moonlight shining bright in its burning eyes.

Major Windham was a trained soldier, and he gave little external sign of the shock he felt; instead he reached for his pistol, and called out to Lachlan to say who he was. But even as he spoke there was a look on his face of horrified recognition. He knew him, despite whatever change the touch of the other world had made—whether from their last meeting by Spean side, or from the Corryarrick, or from their former meetings in life, or from some sense of recognition that did not depend on simply remembering his face, it did not matter. Lachlan's cold heart felt a moment of something like living warmth; he was glad to think that Major Windham recognised him, and that he would know wherefore he died.

'I am vengeance,' he whispered, and stepped closer in the moonlight.

Keith fired the pistol. It was no matter, for the deadly weapon's work could not be done more than once. The shot reached Lachlan's chest this time, but it did him no harm.

Yes, now there was horror... The pistol dropped from the Major's hand, but he did not turn and run; he stood facing Lachlan and drew his sword. Well, that would make no difference either. Lachlan walked forwards—he could still walk though the world, though his feet made no mark nor sound upon the silent sand—and when he was close enough, he went to embrace the Major. There was no need for the dirk or the musket, or the fall of earth, or the rushing water. The kiss of the dead, given or sought, has a terrible power; he would draw Major Windham to himself and pull him after him, away from the world of the living. He could not resist for long. How fitting that the traitor—this Judas—should be slain by a kiss!

But even as Lachlan raised his arms, there was a shout from behind him.

'No! Lachlan—I command you to stop!'

The sound of that voice—though he might, on consideration and in the absence of the man himself, disobey it—could not fail to command Lachlan in the moment. It came to him across the distance between himself and the world of the living, clear as the moonlight, and he responded at once, as he had done ever since his devoted boyhood. He released the Major—who staggered away from him, staring in amazement at Ewen coming across the sands towards them at as much of a run as his leg would allow.

'Keith—you are not hurt?' Ewen said, between gasping breaths, as he placed himself between Keith and the ghost.

'Hurt? No, not at all, I—Ardroy, what is happening? What is—' He seemed unable even to form the second question, as he gestured past Ewen to where the third figure in their little tableau stood.

'No, I see,' said Ewen, more to himself than to Keith. He had gripped Keith's arm with one hand and placed his other arm half round Keith's body—partly simply to support himself on the leg of which he was demanding rather more than it would long stand. But Keith was warm in his arms; he could feel that much; so it was well. Ewen breathed a long sigh of relief, and said, 'No, he has not harmed you. I was in time. Thank God...'

For some moments the three of them remained there upon the white sand, none of them moving—except Keith in positioning his arms, without much conscious thought, to support Ewen a little more comfortably against him—and none of them speaking. Ewen's breathing grew steadier. At last he stood up again, shakily, and turned from Keith towards him who stood behind.

Ewen, when he learnt from the fisherman that Keith Windham was really here in Moidart as he had seen in his dream, had accepted that something of that dream must be true, and hence that Angus's talk of ghosts and of the dead Lachlan coming back to him had not been confused wanderings or the vague visions of the second sight but simple reality; and yet now that he saw the shade of Lachlan before him, out of doors and in a clear light, and quite unmistakeable for a living man, he was taken aback, and stunned almost to silence. Suddenly the thing seemed, not horrifying, but terribly sad. Lachlan's presence here was entirely wrong; seeing him, it was obvious; he ought to have gone on to the next life, as the dead should who have finished their business on earth and go gladly where they are called, and yet he lingered here, so determined was he to do what he believed—and believed wrongly!—that he must do for Ewen's sake.

But Ewen had enough presence of mind, and enough knowledge of his foster-brother's character, to know that he must speak, and quickly. With a conscious feeling of summoning his strength of both body and spirit, he went up to Lachlan and placed his hands firmly on his shoulders, feeling the cold flesh beneath the tattered shirt. 'Lachlan, you must not hurt this man,' he said. 'I know what you think he has done—my foster-father told me of your vow. But you were mistaken; he never betrayed me; he saved my life. If you kill him, you kill my friend.'

All the time he was looking straight into Lachlan's too-bright eyes; now their gaze faltered. 'Mistaken?' whispered Lachlan, in a voice like the wind through pine-tops. 'But—no, Mac 'ic Ailein, I am not mistaken. I heard the soldiers saying—'

'I know what you heard,' cut in Ewen, speaking rapidly and rather harshly. 'It was not true; it was some malicious slander, or foolish rumour; doesn't it seem likely, Lachlan, that the saighdearan dearg might speak falsely even about one of their own?' This piece of logic—justified, Ewen felt, by the degree of honour shown by Keith's superiors, if not by himself—seemed to make itself felt with Lachlan. 'And I know what Major Windham really did. Were it not for him, I should not be here now.'

It was the moon, Ewen thought, which showed Lachlan so much as he really was; for in the silver light cast so softly and so steadily across the dark world, throwing highlights and mysterious shadows beneath the trees, glittering with the sympathy of perfect reflection upon the white sand, they might have been half in the other world already. The trail of light upon the dark water, insubstantial and proudly sure in its brightness, might be the way to the western isles, or to France, or to the kingdoms of the Sleagh Maidh. No wonder that a ghost was strong here. But—and he felt this with an overwhelming certainty—though Ewen had ventured out into this half-shadow world to find him, Keith Windham would not take those strange paths onward this night. Ewen would do what he had not been able to do in his nightmare. He would hold Keith to him and pull him back himself, if he had to; and he would keep his friend in his own world, no matter what ghostly powers—of Lachlan's will, or of fate itself worked out through Angus's heron—were ranged against him.

Keith, who had for the last few minutes been looking between Ewen and Lachlan with horror and amazement, now said again, 'Ardroy, what is happening?'

Ewen had spoken to Lachlan in Gaelic, so that Keith must have had even less chance to understand events than he might have done. 'Windham,' he said now—and his utter relief at finding Keith alive and unharmed was still in his voice as he spoke to him—'my foster-brother has been—under a misapprehension about you, and would have done you harm, believing that he avenged a wrong done to me. I have been putting him right. He will leave you be now.'

'Your foster-brother?' said Keith in bewilderment. 'Then this'—he gestured at Lachlan, who had sunk down upon the sand at Ewen's feet.

'He is the Lachlan MacMartin whom you met at Ardroy last year,' said Ewen, with the shadow of a smile. 'But perhaps you do not remember.'

'Of course,' said Keith. 'I do remember him—and I have met him again since then... But he is—' And he broke off, suddenly uncertain.

'He is dead. He is a ghost,' confirmed Ewen simply. 'I am sorry, Keith... I think I had better speak to him.'

Keith nodded, and turned away, and Ewen sat down heavily upon the sand where Lachlan crouched; fine sand which would have been brilliantly white even by daylight, and which might now have been the silver enchanted earth of a fairy garden. Lachlan's hands were half-buried in it, clutching at it as though it held him to the world.

He looked up at Ewen. 'Then I was wrong,' he said.

'Quite wrong, Lachlan!' said Ewen, his anger rising again as he thought of what would have happened had it not been for his intervention. 'You ought not to have done it... Why did you? What made you stay?'

Lachlan's bright gaze was fixed upon the sand. 'I would do anything,' he said, 'anything for your good, Eoghain—I told you I should give you the blood from my own veins if you asked for it, for it is yours and has been always. And when he and his servant killed me, and my spirit would have left the earth, and left you, I saw what I could give you instead... My soul was nothing to me beside your safety, and vengeance on the one who had wronged you. I thought he had betrayed you. I thought you were going to Carlisle because of him! But I was wrong... for you say that he is your friend.' This speech had at first something of the ardent vehemence which Ewen remembered so well from days past; but the ghostly voice faded away towards the end, so that the last words were spoken in a little chittering whisper.

'He is my friend, Lachlan,' said Ewen, and glanced briefly to where Keith was standing some paces away from them, gazing out into the bay with a troubled frown upon his face. 'The heron brought me only good, when it brought him to me. Ah, but I told you that you should not have shot the bird.' He spoke half in exasperation and half with something more like tenderness; for he found that he could not remain so angry as he had been at first. The evil that might have been was averted; and what was the use of rebuking this poor shade as he had the living man who had killed the heron? He shook his head; and then, briefly, gave Lachlan a true account of what Keith had done upon Beinn Laoigh and afterwards.

Lachlan listened, and as he did the side of his face that was still whole took on an expression of bitter anguish. 'Then I was quite wrong,' he said at last, 'for he has saved your life... he has done what I could not!' And he looked then as though he would have wept, if ghosts could weep.

Ewen frowned in bewilderment. 'What do you mean?' he said. 'I have you to thank for my life also, surely, Lachlan, for 'twas you and Neil who carried me off the field at Culloden, and I should not have been there for Major Windham to save had it not been for you.'

But Lachlan shook his head. 'I betrayed you—I, and not he!' he said. 'I left you in the shieling hut, when I might have stayed by you—and so the redcoats found you and took you prisoner. I had thought that the Major—no, but it was I alone!'

Again the familiar impassioned tone, which Ewen remembered with mixed feelings of impatience and fondness. Then, absorbing the full sense of the words, he sat back on the sand, rather amazed. That Lachlan might see the thing that way had not occurred to him. The true reason why Lachlan had become a wraith now discovered itself to him: for Lachlan had not wanted only to avenge himself on one who he believed had betrayed Ewen, but to atone for what he believed was his own betrayal... and that, Ewen could understand only too well.

For some moments he was at a loss for anything to say. The logical arguments which he might have used—that Lachlan had gone to get food, without which Ewen would have starved; that, defending Ewen outside the shieling hut, he would have been able to do no more than poor Neil had done—would, he saw, make little impression upon Lachlan, whose sense of guilt was not founded upon logical argument. It was, Ewen found, rather uncomfortable to understand so very clearly the position Archie had been in when he had found Ewen in his bedroom at Ardroy that day... But, though he could not reason with Lachlan, he could meet Lachlan's guilt as one who knew exactly from what heartfelt devotion it came—for it had been in his own heart too, at Fort Augustus and afterwards—and he could do better than Archie, for he was himself here to speak to Lachlan in person.

So he said, very softly, 'That is not true, Lachlan.'

Lachlan looked up. The strange burning light of his eyes—like the flame of the will-o'-the-wisp above a bog on a cloudy night—was not easy to meet, but Ewen looked at him steadily, and said in as steady a voice, 'You did not betray me. You did everything you could to help me, always. I should have done the same in your place, had it been Lochiel whom I must help; and, had my mind been guided rightly'—he was thinking again of Archie—'I should have been proud of what I did.'

It was true; all through his life Lachlan had done everything possible for his chieftain's good. Ewen remembered the childhood games in which his foster-brother had always been more eager for Ewen's success than for his own; the youthful hunting trips and the quiet, dogged loyalty which had followed his every step upon the mountains and seen that no mishap befell him; and many things from the last year in the Prince's army... He remembered also the heron shot down over Loch na h-Iolaire, prefigurement of the far greater wrong which Lachlan had done—or which he had almost done—now. Then the amused irritation with which he usually regarded his foster-brother's excesses had turned to real anger; but now, in the face of that greater evil and within sight of the bitter grief which it had come very near to causing him, he was not angry any more. If Lachlan had stuck to his own stubborn belief about what was to Ewen's good even in the face of Ewen's own orders, it had only been because he valued that good above anything else on earth... and now, it seemed, more even than that.

Ewen sighed. The sentiments in his heart were not simple, and he could not explain them all to Lachlan now. Instead he said, gently, 'You meant it for the best. I know that, and I am honoured by your loyalty and your love. But, Lachlan, you have done enough. I have told you there is no need to take revenge on anyone for my sake; there is no need for you to stay here at all. When you go, 'twill be with my blessing. Will you?'

He stood, and took Lachlan's cold hand in his own to help him up after him; but Lachlan dropped to his knees again and clutched Ewen's hand to him. He did not kiss it; he could not.

They stayed like that for a little time, with the moonlight shining upon them.

At last Lachlan, standing also, said, 'I would go, gladly, but—Mac 'ic Ailein, how can I turn my back on you, now that I am here? You may need me yet...'

Ewen could have smiled; despite all that was incredible and uncanny about to-night's encounter, this was his Lachlan! 'To-night,' he said, 'whatever else should happen, I have my life and my freedom, and I shall not forget that it is thanks to you. You can leave me now; 'tis not turning your back; 'tis only going where I shall follow, in good time. Will you do that?'

And Lachlan nodded.

'Then, Lachlan,' said Ewen, 'blessings go with you; may a straight path be before you, and a happy end to your journey!' He pressed Lachlan's hand, still cold beneath his own, once more. 'I do trust that it will be so, my dear brother.'

'Goodbye, Eoghain,' whispered Lachlan. The light of his eyes had dimmed; they looked more like they had in life.

Lachlan turned towards the moon, and the silver path over the water, and Ewen watched him until he was gone.

Then he went over to where Keith stood, at the end of the spur of dark rock which jutted out across the sand.

For much of the time since Ewen's arrival, Keith had been too much preoccupied with the shock of these incredible and bizarre events to think of much else. This, then, was the true explanation of the assassin of Loch Tarff, and of the strange episode by the Spean! He had tried so carefully at the time—so carefully, indeed, that he had not been aware of it—to rationalise the strangeness of that experience; but it had resisted rational explanation, and the still strong and living strangeness had caught up with him again to-night. He shivered at the thought of what might have happened, had Ewen not arrived when he did; there were more outlandish things in the Highlands even than prophecies and the second sight... But despite all this, part of his soldier's mind remained with the more practical circumstances of the present situation, and as Ewen finished his conversation with—his foster-brother... and came over to speak to Keith, the logic of these was becoming more insistent.

'Keith,' said Ewen—and again he was using his Christian name, which caused, for a moment, another sensation entirely to stir in Keith's breast—'I daresay you do not believe in anything that has happened to-night; I could scarcely believe it myself. I must explain it all... You are sure that you are not at all hurt?' he added. His blue eyes were dark in the moonlight and full of concern.

'No, not at all,' said Keith impatiently, 'but—'

'Then I can only say that this must be a great deal more to ask you to believe than even our heron was; but 'tis only too true, as you have already seen. My poor foster-brother is unfailingly loyal to me; I am his chieftain; and believing that you had betrayed me and that he must be avenged on you, he—'

But here Keith interrupted him. 'I see all that. But, Ewen'—he glanced over his shoulder—'don't you know what you have done, in coming here to me?'

Ewen's expression changed; it was not the shock of a troubling realisation; it was the acknowledgement of something he had already known. 'I have done the only thing I could do, Keith,' he said. 'I knew where you were, and that Lachlan was trying to reach you and would surely kill you if he did, for even the most skilful soldier cannot defend himself against a wraith! I could not reach Lachlan before he got to you, for a ghost is not to be found simply anywhere. Sending a message would not have been enough; how could I have explained everything in terms you would believe and understand? So there was only one thing to do. But do not think I haven't understood what it would mean. Of course I know why you are here; you are watching this coast for Jacobite fugitives escaping by such ships as that...' And he nodded towards the faint silver ship lying out in the bay. 'And I am one of them. I am sorry, Keith. I know what it means for you; I remember that penknife at Fort Augustus! I would not have put you in this position, could I have helped it.'

Keith looked at him helplessly. Here was all the reasoning which had been troubling him while Ewen spoke to his foster-brother, set out in perfect order, and only joined to a concern for Keith's own well-being which was startling in its simplicity and sincerity. Meeting Ewen here, it was of course his duty to attempt to take him captive—for Ardroy might not be the Pretender's son, but he was a Jacobite chieftain, cousin to Lochiel, and he had already escaped from the Army's clutches once—and, knowing all this, Ewen had gone calmly into the danger, giving up his own freedom to save Keith's life. It was not Edinburgh over again; it was something far nobler. Truly, Ewen Cameron was his friend... and now Keith must take away his friend's freedom and very probably his life, because Ewen had saved his own.

They were both armed; perhaps, if they fought, Ewen would be the victor, as he had been once before. But no, for he was injured; and—

'Keith, remember that I have some notion of what you risked for my sake, on Beinn Laoigh and when I was in prison. I am glad to do as much for you.'

Keith made a little anguished noise and turned away from him. This was intolerable!

Yet he must come to a decision; and, turning back to face Ewen as he stood there upon the white sand, with the brightness and shadows of the moon showing upon the handsome features the kindest expression Keith had ever seen there, he did.

'You must go quickly,' he said. 'My men will be here soon; there is a patrol on their way out from Morar.' And before Ewen could reply to this, he went on, speaking rapidly, 'Ewen—you have saved my life to-night—and that not even for the first time! And consider—I did not find you while searching for fugitives; you sought me out here, knowing what you risked; and had you not done so, I would not have been able to take you or anyone else prisoner any more. What honour would it be to make you such a return as that?' His voice faltered slightly, but he added, ''Tis the very least I can give you...'

Ewen looked at him, and it seemed that he understood. 'Oh, Keith... But I hope we shall not speak any more of returns and obligations, between friends,' he said, very quietly.

At this Keith smiled. 'Very well,' he said, 'we shall not.'

Ewen met the smile with one of his own, full of all the warmth of his generous heart, and held out his hands. 'Thank you,' he said, as Keith took his hands in both his own. Then he glanced up towards the sea. 'Before we part, I should reassure you that you are in no more danger from Lachlan. He understood that he was mistaken, and that you are my friend—and I think he is gone now... But, Keith, I hope that we shall meet again as friends, in happier times than these. For if the vengeance of a ghost can be turned aside and overcome, then I do not believe my foster-father's prophecy need be the end of things either, for you and me.'

'I hope 'tis not,' said Keith, in an altered tone. 'Yes, some day—' He broke off, and stood looking at Ewen in a happiness which had in it something of perplexity. It seemed suddenly that there was a deeper current running in their conversation than he had been aware of—perhaps hidden until now by the confusion of his dilemma. In this beautiful, unearthly light, which turned all the world into something other than what it was in the simple and orderly day, it was possible to think of things which one would not have acknowledged—or even, perhaps, have noticed—in the too harsh sunlight...

Keith shook his head. That patrol from Morar would be on their way soon. And he was, after everything, very glad that Ewen was going to safety.

'Goodbye, then,' he said at last.

Their hands were still joined, and Ewen was still smiling. Neither did the smile dim or waver as he leaned closer to Keith and, briefly and very gently, kissed his lips.

'Goodbye, Keith—my friend,' said Ewen.

'Always,' said Keith, a little hoarsely. There was no time for anything more—but there would be time, some day, when they met again...

So he squeezed Ewen's hands firmly, then let them go; and then he turned and went back up onto the track beneath the trees, leaving the shining white strand behind him. His brain was in a whirl, but he forced himself to think rationally of what would happen next. No doubt Ewen had friends waiting for him somewhere amongst the low hills, and the party would make haste to be off now that Ewen knew there were soldiers on the way. Keith, meanwhile, would make his way back towards Morar and meet the patrol; and though they must come this way again, they would, he trusted, be too late.

V. Lachlan's Last Disobedience

'Mac 'ic Ailein! Where have you been? Oh, we thought you were lost!'

'I am sorry, Duncan,' said Ewen, holding the low door of the fisherman's cottage for Duncan to come through. 'I had a task of great importance—I shall explain it later, for you are quite right; we must make haste! There is a redcoat patrol coming from Morar,' he went on, as Angus and the MacDonald fisherman emerged into the night air. 'We shall have time to reach the boat before they get to us, but we must hurry. Lead the way, Alastair,' he said to the fisherman.

The cottage stood in a sheltered spot not far from the beach, and they soon reached it—traversing, Ewen found, the route by which he had already come that night. The beach was deserted now; and here was Alastair's boat awaiting them. Its owner bent over it to examine the plug in the bottom—'for the redcoats took the one from Ranald Mor's boat two nights ago—the dogs, to try to drown their enemies by trickery!'—but found it still safely in position.

Ewen's heart was beating. He had a great many cares to trouble him—the grief of one going into exile, caught between dearly-remembered past and uncertain future; his injured leg, which he had certainly been overstraining, and which now hurt dully and constantly; his thoughts of that evening, of poor Lachlan and their strange farewell; and his other farewell to Keith Windham there upon the sand—oh, if they could meet again...! But now, though the thoughts of all these things remained with him, they were as though put away in a corner of his mind, and he felt keenly the thrill of a daring escape from powerful enemies. The redcoat patrol would surely be here soon, and all his strength and courage would be needed to escape. It was almost as good as a fight. If only Lochiel, and of course the Prince, might soon know this triumph too! While Alastair made the last preparations for getting the boat down to the sea, Ewen looked about across the sand. The moon was high and brighter than ever, and the air was getting colder with that prophetic chill which comes to the nights of late summer. Perhaps the sea-mist would gather again later on in the night, but for now they had a clear view out to the ship; their voyage would be easy.

But even as the little wavelets began to lap at the bow of the fishing-boat, there came the sound of marching feet from inland.

'The redcoats!' said young Angus. 'Quickly, Mac 'ic Ailein—' And he took up an oar, the fisherman taking the other.

Ewen glanced back up the beach, and saw with alarm how far the soldiers had already come. But Alastair himself was more stoic. 'Never fear,' he said. 'We shall outrun them.'

Angus and the fisherman had scarcely taken a pull at the oars when the first musket-shot whizzed past them. Duncan, sitting in the stern, motioned to Ewen to crouch down in front of him, that he might shield his chieftain from the fire.

But that shot was not repeated. Instead, a great noise of shouting broke out further up the beach—a sound of confusion and dismay. Something was happening. Ewen craned his neck, trying to look past Duncan without putting himself in the way of more danger than his loyal follower would allow.

In the shade of the trees that grew above the open sand, Keith Windham was cursing the luck of the last few minutes. He had known, of course, that it would be a matter of chance. His choice to let Ewen go earlier in the evening, he could reconcile with his honour; but he must take the patrol along the route they had planned, and he could not do anything to slow or hinder them. He had only hoped that Ewen, knowing of their presence, would be away earlier than this; but here he was, only now reaching the sea. If Keith had spared him, only to be forced to take him captive again after all!...

Keith was at the back of the assembled company, and now there was a sudden noise from the soldiers ahead of him: several shouts went up from amongst the men, followed by Lieutenant Carter's voice commanding order. What had happened? Keith went hastily forwards to see.

A Highlander was running towards them across the sand—running at an astonishingly rapid pace, so that he seemed to advance forty or fifty yards in a few moments; but that must be a trick of the light. He was shouting in Gaelic and brandishing something above his head; whoever he was, he was clearly furious with them. The soldiers seemed unwontedly alarmed at the sight of him; several had raised their muskets as though they meant to fire, although Carter was still trying to hold them back. They were paying no attention at all to the little boat just taking to the waves on the far side of the beach...

Keith added his own voice to the calls for order. There was no need for them to be perturbed by some madman—for surely it must be a madman, to attempt an attack on a whole patrol of redcoats. Or—Keith's heart sank as the possibility occurred to him—could it be one of Ewen's followers, ready to sacrifice himself that the others might escape?

Then the man came closer, and Keith saw who he was, and what had so alarmed the soldiers. There was no trick of the light...

One of the men fired his musket. His target was by now close enough that there could be no mistaking what happened: the ball entered his chest and went straight through him as if he had been made of water. He went on running, unharmed.

At this, chaos broke out. Some of the men turned and fled; Lieutenant Carter went after them, trying desperately to turn the flight into some sort of managed retreat. Keith ran in amongst the soldiers who remained on the beach. 'Keep your positions!' he said. 'There is no real danger.' He wondered with an uncomfortable shiver whether that was true. Ewen had persuaded his loyal foster-brother that there was no need for his intended revenge, so that this could not be a renewed attack; but he must be trying to protect Ewen from the soldiers, and what would he think necessary to achieve that end? In any case, the greatest danger to the men now was surely that of inadvertently firing their own muskets on each other in their confusion; so he must calm them at all costs.

The ghost was still running across the beach; but now, making towards the trees, he came level with Keith, and stopped for a moment and looked at him.

'Keith Windham,' he said, in his weird ghostly voice. He was some paces away from Keith, but he might have been standing next to him, the sound was so clear. 'I saw what you did earlier. You are his friend; you helped him. I will help him too. I will help you.'

Keith stared at him for a long moment, while astonishment gave way gradually in his mind to dawning understanding and, with it, admiration—and then he smiled. 'Yes,' he said, in a low voice, that his men might not hear. 'Yes, I see. Thank you, Lachlan.'

For a moment the wraith returned his smile. Keith cast his mind briefly back over the strange and eventful history of his acquaintance with Lachlan MacMartin, and it occurred to him that this was the first time he had seen him really smile; the ghostly, ravaged face seemed transformed almost to that of a different man. Then Lachlan let out a suitably blood-curdling yell and chased after a group of fleeing redcoats; this occasioned a fresh outbreak of panic amongst the rest, and several more men fired their muskets. Keith at once renewed his efforts to calm them down; but even while he did so, he saw out of the corner of his eye the little fishing-boat, far out on the waves, well on its way to the French ship. Yes, they were out of reach now...

And, throughout the chaos and unpleasantness of the next few hours, as he and Carter rounded up the men and upbraided them thoroughly—for, whatever he might privately feel about the fact of their failure, he was really displeased at the soldiers' cowardice, forgetfulness of their duty and dangerous recklessness, which were disgraceful purely in themselves—there was the blessed warmth of the thought of Ewen, going to safety at last.

This chase was different indeed to his earlier pursuits of Major Windham. How much lighter of heart he was—for he meant these foolish redcoats no real harm—and how much freer from fear and from that terrible, all-consuming need for revenge which had been with him all through these last months like a weight hung upon his wandering soul. Yet he had a purpose now too, and a far better one than his late misguided quest for vengeance. He had committed one last disobedience against his chieftain this night—or at least had allowed Ewen to believe that he was doing otherwise than he had really done—in staying near him just a little while longer, for the greatest of all reasons: to help him escape!

And it was this purpose which he saw answered in the eyes of the Major as they met his own, and heard in the kind words he spoke to him. Then he really knew that Keith Windham was Ewen's friend, and wished for Ewen's good just as Lachlan himself did.

It was not with unmixed gladness that he recognised it. The grounds for real enmity towards Major Windham had been revealed as a mistake, but the grounds for jealousy of him remained. He was Ewen's friend, in a way that Lachlan himself never had been; he had met Ewen in a world which Lachlan could not enter, even in life; in true friendship had Ewen invited him into his house, and now Lachlan had not even the comfort of thinking the Major's acceptance of that friendship and hospitality a false deception. So that bitterness remained. And yet—Lachlan knew that we are called upon to forgive our enemies, however grievously they have injured us, and to do so when we depart this world more than at any other time. Ewen would be grieved if Lachlan did not try his utmost to do his Christian duty, in this last hour. Another motive added its strength to this religious conviction: the knowledge that he and Keith Windham, the dead man and the man still living, wanted the same thing, and might both be happy in its achievement. It seemed to Lachlan rather strange that Windham should go on acting the redcoat Major, leading out the patrol as though in sincere pursuit, when really he desired nothing more than the escape of those he pursued; but it did not seem strange that, although an Englishman and a redcoat, he should desire this. Nothing was so natural to Lachlan's mind as loyalty and love for Ewen.

Thus did Lachlan MacMartin forgive his enemy at last; and it is possible that those unfortunate fellow-Jacobites who publicly forgave the Elector and his followers even as they stood upon the scaffold had not to make a greater effort of charity than this poor ghost. But it was right to let go of the bitterness and jealousy which had been his in life, before he went on to the next world.

There was a slight rise in the ground above the sand, where some of the fleeing soldiers had run. Lachlan stood there for a moment and looked back towards the sea, where silver glittered upon the black water. The little boat was moving rapidly across the water, and while Lachlan watched it came level with the side of the great ship. As the figures in the boat began to move and gesture towards the other figures leaning over the ship's side to see them, one of them turned his head and glanced towards the land; and—for distances on earth mean very little to one whose soul is not wholly in this world—the dear, well-remembered blue eyes met Lachlan's for the last time on earth.

Lachlan MacMartin's soul had lingered in the world through the single-minded strength of his will, all bent on one purpose; but that purpose had proved a mirage, founded upon an error and not doing the good to Ewen which had been his one all-consuming wish. Now, however, he had achieved his real, true purpose, for which his heart had wished more than anything; and he saw that in this fulfilment was the real end for which he had remained on earth. All things were ordered for the best, in the end. Ewen was alive and going to safety.

And so he turned away from the distant ship, and from the shouts of the redcoats, and from the moon. Already it seemed to him that the pale, silvery light, so fitting for a world of griefs and errors and ghosts, was fading from round him, and dissolving into the brilliance of another light. Lachlan walked towards it, and stepped no longer upon the sandy earth of Morar. Someone was calling him—surely the voice was his brother's!

Yes, he would go. He was going from Ewen, his heart's dearest love in life, and the parting was a grief even now; but he would see him again one day, just as Ewen himself had said. And for now, his work on earth was done, and he would rest and be at peace.

A Grimly Ghost

Contents

Prologue: An Unquiet Grave

I. 'Crept in at My Bed-Foot...'

II. A Strange Encounter

III. The Peats on the Fire

IV. More Unreal in the Moonlight

V. Lachlan's Last Disobedience