“Now first of all I must make my own position clear,” said Myrtle. “I’m devoted to Ben Nevis.” She found the scowl on the poet’s brow so entrancing that she repeated her assertion with great emphasis for the pleasure of seeing it deepen. “And Mrs Royde is also devoted to Ben Nevis,” she went on, with a sidelong look to see the effect of that statement on the scowl. Either it was already as deep as he could make it or the announcement of Carrie’s devotion had no more effect than the announcement of her own. “At the same time,” Myrtle continued, “my sister-in-law is terribly worried because she’s afraid you will think she may have said something to Ben Nevis about the plan you told her you had to kidnap him.”

“We gave up that idea as soon as we heard Ben Nevis was a friend of Mistress Royde,” James Buchanan said.

“Well, of course, I don’t want to say anything that might sting you into longing to show that you could kidnap Ben Nevis, but … oh well, I won’t say it. All I want to have you realize is that Ben Nevis is the toughest thing in kilts since Robert Bruce.”

“Bruce didn’t wear the kilt,” both young men contradicted simultaneously.

“Well, whatever he wore, I guess he was tough all right. And so’s Ben Nevis, believe me. While you and my sister-in-law were having your quiet afternoon together yesterday, I was with him up on the moors, and if you’d seen the way he laid about a camping party and shut them up in the dungeons of his castle you’d know just how tough he is. Well, somebody brought him word that you two were camping out somewhere around on his land, and this afternoon he aims to have you both thrown into the nearest loch. That’s what’s worrying Mrs Royde. She enjoyed your hospitality yesterday in your camp, and she just can’t bear the idea of a watery grave for both of you. And now I’ve met you both I can’t say I’m tickled to death at the notion myself. So put our minds at rest by moving away from Ben Nevis’s hunting-grounds, and when I see Mrs Royde at lunch I’ll be able to tell her my mission has been successful.”

“Are you seriously suggesting, Miss Royde, that this swollen-headed, Anglicized, degenerate laird will try to throw my friend and me into a loch?” James Buchanan asked.

“It’s not a suggestion at all. He certainly will,” Myrtle declared.

“Did you ever hear the like of that, Alan?” James asked.

The question acted like a pitchfork on the bard’s shock of fair hair, tossing it in every direction.

Myrtle thought she had never seen hair glint so cunningly.