The Master of Stair 16
“With the first daylight we were in our ranks; the mist hung over the
pass like the standard o’ the Highlands; we could see no further than
each other, but we could hear the rattle o’ the Lowland guns as they
dragged them up the pass. They fired, and hideous was the sound of it.
I saw a Cameron drop, close to Lochiel, and Glengarry wince from his
place. We were new to the muskets, but we did what we might; the mist
rose, but up the glen the cannon smoke rolled thick and white, we could
not see. Once I looked up and saw the sky overhead was clear and blue;
it seemed a strange thing and turned me giddy. The sun began to glitter
down our muskets. Dundee came up at the head of his Lowland horse; he
spoke to Lochiel and I saw him strain forward and look down the pass;
then he gave the word. We threw down our plaids and Lochiel tossed his
shoes aside; we gave the war-cry in a great shout. Up from the smoking
glen came a shaking cheer in answer, and Lochiel laughed up at Dundee.
‘The thing is done, my lord. Do men who are going to win shout so?’
“‘Charge!’ cried Dundee; there was a great flush on his face.
“We flung aside the muskets and were out with the dirks. I would have
charged into the cannon’s mouth for I felt immortal, but as I rushed I
fell and the flying feet of the Macdonalds bruised me to the earth. I
could not rise. I saw Dundee motion to his men, but they hesitated—the
Lowland cowards hesitated.
“Dundee rose in the saddle; he lifted his hat and the sun glittered,
very brightly, on his hair; from where I lay I shouted at the cowards
behind him, then a cloud of smoke hid him. I struggled to my feet; the
air was full of confusion and cries of victory; the Lowlanders were
running like sheep. I saw the gunners struggling in the press, the
standard o’ Lochiel flying through the smoke, and, midst it all,
Dundee’s black horse dash riderless down the glen!”
Ronald stopped abruptly, with a shudder of excitement at the
remembrance of that day. Ian, thrilled to forgetfulness of the cold and
the dead fire, waited with eyes eager through the dark.
“One came up to me,” continued Ronald, “and asked me for my plaid.
‘Dundee is dying,’ he said; I followed to where he lay. Dunfermline
held him off the ground; they took my plaid and laid it under him to
keep him off the heather.
“‘How goes the day?’ he asked faintly.
“Dunfermline answered, very white: ‘Well, for King James, but I am
sorry for ye, Jock.’
“‘If ’tis well for the King, ’tis the less matter for me,’ said Dundee,
but there was an awful look in his eyes and I think he thought of his
wife and the boy he had never seen. He did not speak again; I think he
would not; he turned his face away and died as the victory shout rose
up the glen.
“Dunfermline covered him with my plaid. ‘The war is over,’ he said in a
broken voice. ‘Dundee is dead.’
“I helped to carry him to his grave, and I took his spy-glass from his
sash; ’twas broken with his fall, but I kept it for rememberance. I
loved Dundee. Would I lay with him in his nameless grave in Blair
Athol!”
His voice sank miserably into silence, and there was no sound.
The clouds drifted apart over a snowy moon; there was a sense of utter
desolation abroad, the cold peace of loneliness.
Ronald rose and walked away from his brother toward the moonlight with
the wind cool on his face; he shook with a stormy agony and cried out
low and passionately:
“Would I had died with Dundee before I had been poisoned with love o’
thee, Margaret Campbell!”
CHAPTER VIII
MACCALLUM MORE
The Countess Peggy sat in the drawing-room of her lord’s handsome house
in Edinburgh and measured out tea with a heavy rat-tailed spoon.
It was a fine chamber with smooth polished cream-colored walls and long
French windows, hung with flowered curtains of a dull pink; the
furniture, black and a little heavy, caught in its clear-cut Jacobean
facets the light from the dozen candles in a silver stand that burnt
over the tea-table. The Countess wore a purple gown with paniers and a
fine lace kerchief fastened with diamonds on her bosom; a screen of
drawn red silk stood between her and the fire and cast a glow over her
face and neck, lay reflected, too, in the hollow of the shining white
and pink cups.
There was a fragrant smell of tea and the gentle hiss of boiling water
from the silver kettle; it was a comfortable room, a comfortable hour;
the Countess’s green eyes were soft with content like a soothed petted
cat’s before a fire.
Her one companion lay back lazily on a low settee and gazed, rather
vacantly, into the fire; he was a slight man with a fretful weak face,
pale eyes too full, and a thin irresolute mouth.
He was handsomely dressed, and for all his unprepossessing appearance,
carried an air of high lineage, wealth, position and power.
The Countess finished mixing the tea, then glanced at the man opposite;
there was impatience and a slow amused scorn in her eyes; she spoke and
it was in the tone of one who speaks down to his hearer.
“Cousin,” she said, “I am glad to be out of the Hielands—Kilchurn is
ower damp and cold this weather.”
She handed him his tea and he put out a feeble white hand to take it.
“Ye should pull it down,” he said half-peevishly. “I canna ken how ye
can live there—I’d as soon step in my grave as live in Inverary in the
winter.”
His accent was very slight; he had the speech of a man who had lived
abroad and learned many tongues.
The Countess Peggy smiled.
“Ye are the first Argyll, cousin,” she said, “who has disliked Inverary
Castle, and as for pulling down Kilchurn, we’re no’ intending it. Jock
is ower busy building up what the Macdonalds destroy.”
Argyll drew closer to the fire, balancing his tea-cup with the anxiety
of a man to whom a slop in the saucer would be a disaster.
“I’m weary of the name of Macdonald, cousin,” he said. “I marvel
Breadalbane hath let them gain such an upper hand; they should be
hanged and done with.”
“My lord—that consummation approaches,” she answered, hardening,
through her smile, at his implied slight to her husband. “’Tis no’ the
lack o’ power but policy has held Jock’s hand.”
The Earl of Argyll lifted his eyes fretfully.
“Policy! Always this talk of policy! If it had na been for my father’s
‘policy’ in joining Monmouth in ’85, he would na have lost his head or
the Campbells the Hielands....”
She interrupted.
“But the triumph o’ your return, cousin, made full amends for your
father’s downfall.”
He shrugged his shoulders, sipping his tea; he had the manner of a man
with a grievance.
“Certainly I return to the Hielands, but what do I find?” he
complained. “The Macdonalds overrunning everything, Campbells hanged at
sight, my houses gone to ruin—long arrears of rent due and the Stewarts
o’ Appin, the Camerons, the Macnaughtens, and these cursed Macdonalds
refusing to pay a farthing.”
The Countess Peggy gave him a bright glance. “We have our chance noo,”
she said. “Our chance, Cousin Archibald, for our revenge.” She offered
him as she spoke a little glass dish of macaroons, and he carefully
selected one not too sugared before he answered.
“We?” he questioned. “You and Breadalbane have little to complain of—I
dinna call to mind any misfortune in your branch.”
There was a note of bitterness in his voice; he could not forget that
while he had been living in a Dutch garret his cousin Breadalbane had
managed to keep even with every government and come out at the end with
unimpaired estates and a title as good as his own.
The Countess understood this and smiled.
“Dinna forget that we are Campbells, too,” she said. “And we hae had
many wrongs frae the Hielands.” She tilted the tea-urn with half-shut
eyes—“Particularly the Macdonalds,” she added.
Argyll looked at her a second.
“Does Breadalbane think they willna’ come in?” he asked.
“Cousin, he is sure of it—vera few will.”
“Ah!” Argyll gave a luxurious little sigh of satisfaction. “I thought
so—I had orders to quarter my regiment at Dunblane—and quietly.”
“Orders frae the Master of Stair?”
“Yes.”
“He is at Kensington noo?” asked the Countess.
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