“No, I can’t trap them, thanks to the grandmotherly laws under which we suffer, but I can clear them off my land, and I will too. They’re a fouler pest than rabbits. They’re worse than bracken. Are hikers going to be able to do what the Macintoshes were never able to do? Am I or am I not the twenty-third MacDonald of Ben Nevis?”

“Gently now, gently, Ben Nevis. You’re getting very red in the face. You mustn’t excite yourself too much. It’s very annoying, right enough. Och, it’s terrible. But you mustn’t let it boil your blood too much. If I call in the beaters we might move along to the Derrybeg. It’s not too late at all.”

“I’m not going to shoot another bird to-day. The morning bag was the best for six years. I’m not going to spoil it. I want to find these hikers. Go and get hold of my two boys and Kilwhillie. I can’t ask my other guests … no, stay where you are and I’ll speak to them myself.”

The Chieftain strode across the moor, his kilt swinging, his sporran jigging, his amaranthine nose cleaving the air. He came to the butt at which Colonel Lindsay-Wolseley was standing.

“Look here, Wolseley, you had a lot of experience on the North-West Frontier. I want your help. There’s a band of filthy hikers loose in Strathdiddle.”

Colonel Wolseley looked a little apprehensive. He did not immediately perceive the link between Inverness-shire and Waziristan.

“What action exactly were you proposing to take, Ben Nevis?”

“I’m going to round the brutes up. They’ve ruined any hope of good sport on Drumcockie for to-day. And I don’t see why they should get away with it.”

“You mean you’re going to turn them off your land?”

“I’m going to lock them up in Glenbogle for a couple of nights and see if that’ll give them the lesson they deserve.”

“You’re proposing to use force?” the Colonel asked, amazement only kept in check by the traditions of his caste and calling.

“When these savages see themselves covered by half a dozen guns I don’t assume they’ll offer any resistance,” the Chieftain barked.

“But you can’t threaten to shoot trespassers, Ben Nevis. You really can’t.”

“I can and I will,” he declared.