“If that’s all we have to offer we won’t get very far. What we have to teach the world is how to make the best of itself.”

“But isn’t that a mystical message of spiritual hope?”

“Not at all,” the bard replied, with a hint of petulance. “We have to teach the world how to make the best practical use of itself.”

“Ay, that’s what the world has to learn,” James Buchanan agreed. “And that’s what a free Scotland could teach it.”

“Well, I must say you both puzzle me. I thought your idea for a free Scotland was to restore the spirit of the past and so set an example to the world of to-day. Surely spiritual values are what we all so badly need?”

“We don’t object to spiritual values qud se,” said the bard. “But we have realized the danger of putting thought before action. Therefore although I write a good deal of poetry I know that what I call poetic action is the only poetry really worth while. For instance I consider that when James and myself camp here in Glenbristle in defiance of a notice-board forbidding camping that is more truly poetry than for me to write verse about deserted glens and lone shielings in the misty islands. That’s just stale emotionalism. James and I are strictly practical people.”

“In every way,” James agreed.

“We told you about our secret society,” Alan went on.

“You didn’t tell me very much about it,” Carrie put in reproachfully.

“That’s another example of poetic action,” the bard insisted. “It’s an extremely practical society.”

“Well, of course I can’t pass an opinion about that,” Carrie said, “because I don’t know what your aims are except what Mr James told me about statistics. I know you want to change all those statistics.”

The bard looked at the lawyer.

“I think we might tell Mistress Royde a few of our ideas, for instance that one about kidnapping MacDonald of Ben Nevis. Obviously we can’t do that now because it would involve her.”

“You weren’t going to kidnap Ben Nevis?” Carrie gasped.

“Only as part of a general campaign for kidnapping lairds,” the bard explained. “But don’t worry, Mistress Royde. There are plenty of others. We’ll leave Ben Nevis out of the general campaign, at any rate for this year.”

“I’m afraid you’ll think me terribly dense,” said Carrie. “But I wish you’d explain just exactly what would be the practical value of kidnapping lairds.”

“The creation of a state of uneasiness among the landed class,” James informed her. “The same with the rich business men. We aim to kidnap quite a few of them. Trades-union leaders too. Ministers. Sheriffs. Schoolmasters. The Editor of the Glasgow Herald. The Editor of the Scotsman. The general idea is to shake up complacency.”