The Collected Works of D. K. Broster. D. K. Broster

Alison—do you suppose that she found her wedded happiness any longer or more satisfying than you did? God knows, my dear Ewen, I hold that neither wife, children, nor home should stand in a man’s way when duty and loyalty call him—for, as you know, I have turned my back on all mine—but when duty and loyalty are silent, then he does very wrong if he neglects those ties of nature.”

      And on that Archibald Cameron, conceiving that he had preached long enough, got up from the bed. Ewen was still lying with his face hidden: was there something on his mind, as Miss Cameron affirmed? The doctor went and looked out of the far window, and saw the lady in question scattering meal to her hens.

      “Archie,” came from the bed after a moment or two, “if I go, it is only on one condition, which you can grant.”

      “I?” said Dr. Cameron, turning round, rather surprised. Ewen had raised himself on to an elbow. He looked oddly pale and strained. “What is the condition, ’ille?”

      “That I see Lochiel first.” And over his fair skin there swept a wave of red.

      It occurred to Dr. Archibald then how strange it was that Ewen, for all his intense devotion, had not yet asked news of his kinsman and Chief. But he looked doubtful. “I am afraid that would be difficult, because you are both disabled; you cannot travel to him, nor he to you.”

      “Yes, I had thought of that,” said Ewen, now quite pale again. “But I must contrive it somehow.” And as Archie was silent, reflecting, he added, with a sharp note in his soft voice, “Is there any other reason why I should not?”

      “Of course not—save that you will meet in France, please God.”

      “That will not serve. I must see him before I leave Scotland. I know that he is no longer in Lochaber.” The short phrases were jerked out; even more so the last one: “Archie, where is he?”

      “He——” Archie was beginning, when unfortunately he heard Miss Cameron calling to him from below, possibly uttering a warning of some kind. He turned sharply to the window and never finished. But on Ewen the effect was of a man who has second thoughts about answering a question, and is not only mute, but turns his back upon the questioner.

      In his present state of mind, it was quite enough, and next moment, to his visitor’s amazement, he had thrown himself off the bed with such violence that he staggered. “I knew it!” he exclaimed hoarsely. “You will not tell me where he is because you have heard what I did at Fort Augustus—because Lochiel has heard it. I am not to be trusted! That is why you came. I believe—why you want me gone at any price from Scotland!” And as Archibald Cameron, already swung round again from the window, stared at him in consternation, Ewen added, clenching his hands, “I’ll not go! I’ll not be got rid of like that! I’ll get myself killed here in Lochaber . . . the only thing I can do in expiation.” And with that he sank down on the side of the bed and hid his face in his hands.

      Dr. Cameron hastily left the window, but before his amazement allowed him words, Ewen was adding, in a strangled voice, “You are quite right, from your point of view, neither to let me see him nor to tell me where he is. But, Archie, I swear to you by my father’s memory that I did not do it willingly! How can he believe that of me!”

      His cousin stooped and put a hand on his shoulder. “Ewen,” he said with great gentleness, “I have not the least notion what you are talking about. What did you do at Fort Augustus? Nothing, I’d stake my soul, that your father’s son need ever be ashamed of. You would have let yourself be ‘cut in pieces’ first, eh? I was just on the point of telling you where Lochiel was; he is in Badenoch, hiding in a hut on Ben Alder with Macpherson of Cluny. Now,” he sat down and slipped his arm completely along the bowed shoulders, “will you tell me what is on your mind, and why you must see him?”

      CHAPTER IV

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      Thinking it over afterwards, Ewen knew why it had been such a comfort to tell Archie; it was that Dr. Cameron seemed to understand so well what he had suffered that he never tried to belittle the cause of it. Instead of attempting to minimise this he said that he would have felt exactly the same had such a terrible mischance befallen him. Only how could Ewen at any stage have imagined that Donald, if he heard of his lapse, would ever believe that he had made a disclosure willingly?

      “I blame you for that, my poor Ewen,” he said, shaking his head. “You must surely have known that he would as soon suspect me as you, who have been like an elder son to him, who so nearly threw away your life for him at Fort William. . . . I think that’s the worst part of your confession, but as you say that I am not to suppress anything I must tell him that too, though it will hurt him.”

      Ewen raised his colourless face, to which, however, a measure of tranquillity had already returned. “I am sorry for that; but you must not keep back a word. Tell him how I allowed myself to fall asleep when I suspicioned it might be dangerous; tell him that I insulted Lord Loudoun somewhat unworthily—he would not have done that—tell him everything. You are only a proxy, you know, Archie—though a very satisfactory one,” he added gratefully. “There’s no other man save Lochiel that I could have told. Dhé, but I feel as if Ben Nevis had been lifted off me!”

      Archibald Cameron gave his arm a little pressure. “Now ’tis my turn to make a confession to you. When I first came into this room I found myself emulating that Captain Greening of yours—whom, by the way, I should rejoice to meet on some good lonely brae, with a precipice near by. But, like your talking, my dear lad, my overhearing was accidental.”

      “Do you mean that I was saying things in my sleep again? Archie, this is intolerable!”

      “You bade me loose your arm when I touched you, and spoke of preferring to be ‘cut in pieces’ and of ‘another way’. You have just told me what that ‘other way’ was. Ewen, what was the first way, and who took it with you? You have not told me everything, after all.”

      The young man was looking on the floor, and there was colour enough in his face now. “I do not very much wish to revive that memory. . . . But if you must know, I was near being flogged by order of the Lowland officer who captured me. He had been going to shoot me first—I’ll tell you of that anon. It was because he wanted . . . what they wanted and got at Fort Augustus.—No, do not look so horrified, Archie; he did not carry it out (though I’ll admit I believed he was going to). It was only a threat.”

      “Then, if it was only a threat,” remarked Dr. Cameron, looking at him closely, “why did you call me a ‘damned torturer’ when I touched you?”

      “I . . . Really, Archie, I cannot be responsible for everything I say in my sleep. I apologise, but if you were worth your salt you would give me some drug to cure me of the cursed habit!”

      “I’m afraid the drug does not exist, my dear boy. When your mind is at peace you will not do it any more. And don’t you think that it would conduce to that state if you told me why you called me so unpleasant a name?”

      Ewen gave him a little shake. “Mo thruaigh, Archie Cameron,” he said with vivacity, “I begin to think it was because you merit it with this persistence of yours! If I said that, I suppose I must have been remembering that when one has had a bayonet through one’s arm not long before, it is conveniently sensitive, that is all. But after a few experiments, Major Guthrie found that it was not sensitive enough. They knew better how to do things at Fort Augustus.”

      Archibald Cameron still gazed at him, compressing his lips. “So the Lowlander tried ‘experiments’, did he? And do you still consider yourself a traitor, Ewen? I’d give you a rather different name, and so, I fancy, will Lochiel.”

      “But I don’t mean you to tell Lochiel that! No, Archie, that was not confession—you got it out of me unfairly!”

      “Unfortunately you made me promise to tell him everything,” retorted his cousin, smiling. “To turn to another