D. Broster - The Jacobite Trilogy

As Keith was putting his foot in the stirrup Dougal Mackay caught his arm and said excitedly, “I wass hearing a shout, sir!”

“I heard nothing,” responded Major Windham, listening. “Where did it come from?”

The orderly pointed ahead. “The men that shouted will pe round the other side of this beinn. Let us make haste, sir!”

Praying that the Highlander was not mistaken Keith scrambled into the saddle, and his horse began to strain up the slope. He himself could hear nothing but the melancholy notes of a disturbed plover, which was wheeling not far above their heads, and he cursed the bird for drowning more distant sounds. Then, sharp through the mournful cry, there did come a sound, the crack of a shot—of two shots—and the mountains re-echoed with it.

For a moment both Keith and his orderly instinctively checked their horses; then Keith struck spurs into his, and in a few minutes the panting beast had carried him to the top of the shoulder . . . and he had his view.

Directly before him rose another mountain-side, much greener than the rest, and this greenness extended downwards into the almost level depression between it and the slope whose summit he had now reached. Below him, in this narrow upland valley, stood a small group of rough huts for use when the cattle were driven up to the summer pasture, and in front of these was drawn up a body of redcoats, to whom a mounted officer was shouting orders. On the ground near the entrance of the largest shieling lay a motionless Highlander. The shots thus explained themselves; the soldiers were at their usual work, and Keith had ridden into the midst of it. He felt weariness and disgust, but he needed direction too badly not to be glad to meet with those who could give it. Presumably the detachment was from the post on Wade’s road, and the officer might even be Major Guthrie himself. Hoping that the worst was now over, he rode slowly down the hillside through the bloomless heather, unnoticed by the group below.

The fern-thatched roof of one of the shielings had already been fired, and to its first cracklings Keith realised with distaste that the butchery was not yet finished. Three or four scarlet-clad figures came out of the hut before which the dead man lay, half carrying, half dragging another Highlander, alive, but evidently wounded. The officer pointed, and they followed the usual summary method in such cases, and, after planting him against the dry-stone wall of the building itself, withdrew, leaving him face to face with the firing-party. But apparently their victim could not stand unsupported, for a moment or so after they had retired he slid to one knee and then to the ground.

“Detestable!” said Major Windham to himself. He had recognised the tartan now—the one of all others that he would never mistake, for he had worn it himself—the Cameron. But that did not surprise him. The doomed Highlander was now struggling to his feet again; he gained them unaided, and, steadying himself with one hand against the wall behind him, stood once more upright, so tall that his head was well above the edge of the low thatch. Now Keith was near enough to see the lower end of a dirty bandage round his left thigh, and the whole of another on his sword-arm, for all that he had upon him was a kilt and a ragged shirt. And——

“Good God!” exclaimed the Englishman aloud; and, calling out at the top of his voice, “Stop! stop!” he drove the spurs into his horse, came slithering down the last part of the slope, raced towards the shieling, leapt off, and, holding up his hand—but all faces were now turned towards him—ran in between the already levelled muskets and Ewen Cameron.

Ewen alone had not seen him. His face was the colour of the wall behind him; his eyes were half closed, his teeth set in his lower lip, and it was plain that only his force of will was keeping him upright there. A tiny trickle of blood was beginning to course down his bare leg. And even the blind instinct to face death standing could keep him there no longer; for the second time he swayed, and the wounded leg gave way under him again. But this time Keith’s arms caught him as he sank.

Oblivious of the stupefaction which had descended upon the soldiers, and of the more than stupefaction manifested by the officer behind them, Keith lowered that dead weight to the ground and knelt beside it. In Ardroy’s gaunt face a line of white showed under the closed lids, and Keith’s hand pressed on the torn shirt found a heartbeat so faint that he thought, ‘He was dying when they dragged him out, the brutes!’ Perhaps he had not been in time after all. He remembered that there was brandy in his holster, and looked up with an idea of summoning Mackay.

But by this time the officer had ridden up, and was there a pace or two away, towering over the pair by the wall.

“Am I tae tak ye for a surgeon, sir?” he enquired in a strong Lowland accent, and in a tone compounded of hot rage and cold. “If sae, an’ ye’ll hae the kindness tae shift yersel’ oot o’ the way for a meenut, there’ll be nae further need o’ yer sairvices!”

Keith laid Ewen’s head down on the grass, and, standing up, regarded the rider, a neat, fair-complexioned Scot of about five-and-forty, with little light eyes under sandy brows.

“Major Guthrie, I think?” he suggested, and saluted him. “I am Major Keith Windham of the Royals, on General Hawley’s staff, and now on my way with despatches from His Royal Highness to Perth.”

“I care little if ye hae despatches frae God Himsel’!” retorted Major Guthrie with increasing fury. “And this isna Perth . . . Haud awa frae yon wa’—unless ye’ve a fancy tae be shot tae!”

But Keith did not move. “This is not a common Highlander, sir,” he said, as calmly as he could. “He is an officer, despite his dress.” For officers, as Major Guthrie must know, were not shot in cold blood—now.

“What’s that tae me?” enquired Guthrie. He turned. “Here, ye sumphs, pit him up afore the wa’ again!”

Two of the men made an undecided move forwards, but the sight of this other officer of equal rank standing so resolutely in front of the prostrate Highlander daunted them.

“But listen, Major Guthrie,” pleaded Keith, keeping a tight hold upon his own rapidly rising temper and disgust, “this gentleman is really of more than ordinary importance, for he was at one time aide-de-camp to the Pretender’s son, and he is Lochiel’s near kinsman—some kind of cousin, I think. You surely would not——”

“Lochiel’s near kinsman, did ye say?” interrupted Guthrie, bending down a little. “Hoo is he called?”

“Cameron of Ardroy, a captain in Lochiel’s regiment. I am sure,” went on Keith, eager to follow up the impression which Lochiel’s name appeared to have made, “I am sure you will recognise, Major, that the Duke would not wish him to be shot out of hand like this!”

“Indeed I’m obliged tae ye, Major Somebody or ither, for sae kindly instructing His Royal Highness’s wishes tae me,” retorted the Lowlander, but he bent still farther from the saddle, and gazed down for a moment at what was lying so still by the wall—at the dirty, bloodstained, half-clothed figure which Keith had last seen so gallant in powder and satin, cool, smiling and triumphant. The plea he had offered—the only plea that he could think of—was it going to save Ewen Cameron from lying there stiller yet? He tried to read Guthrie’s intentions on his face, but all that he could see there was its innate meanness and cruelty.

The saddle creaked as the rider came upright again. He looked down at Keith himself now with eyes that seemed to hold a flickering light.

“This is God’s truth ye’re tellin’ me, that yon”—he pointed contemptuously—“is Lochiel’s cousin?”