“James is going back to Glasgow to-morrow, anyway,” said the bard. “And I’ll accept no favours from a man like Ben Nevis. It’s against my political principles.”

“How rigid you are! But what are you going to do if Ben Nevis really does get violent? I mean to say there are only two of you. You couldn’t hope to win in a fight. I’ve seen what he can do with sixteen hikers, and eight of them women. And when Mr Buchanan leaves you tomorrow, what will you do, Mr Macmillan?”

“I am not going to run away from Ben Nevis,” the bard declared. “I’ll not do that for anybody.”

“I’ll tell you what you might do, Alan,” said his friend. “You might move up to that cave on Ben Cruet. They’re not likely to find you there.”

“Uaimh na laoigh,” the bard muttered, paying such great attention to the correct pronunciation of the Gaelic that Myrtle thought he was groaning.

“Oh, you’re in pain,” she exclaimed with quick sympathy.

The bard looked at her in astonishment.

“No, I’m not.”

“But you groaned as if you were in pain.”

“I wasn’t groaning,” said the bard indignantly. “ I was saying the name of the cave in Gaelic. Uaimh na laoigh. The Cave of the Calf.”

“Pardon me. That’s where I lag behind my sister-in-law. She knows Gaelic.”

“Not very much,” the bard commented.

“Oh well, of course I can’t criticize,” Myrtle said, aware of a slight pleasure in the fact that Carrie did not know very much Gaelic. “But I think this plan for you to go and live in a cave is very good. Is it terribly far away from where we are now?”

“If you can get a little way up the brae at the back I can show you more or less where it is,” Alan volunteered.

James Buchanan nodded agreement with some reflection of his own.

Scrambling up to a point whence the whereabouts of the cave could be pointed out involved a good deal of help from Alan’s hand for Myrtle, who thought it must have been the long walk from Glenbogle Castle which had made her a little stiff.

At last they reached a level grassy ridge from which Alan pointed out a mass of stone some seven or eight hundred feet up the slopes of Ben Cruet on the other side of which was the Cave of the Calf.

“It’s quite an easy climb,” he assured Myrtle.

“And I’m getting better and better at climbing every day,” she told him. “How long do you think you’ll camp in that cave?”

“I’ve only provisions for three days.”

“Only for three days? And then what will you do?”

“I’ll have to camp somewhere nearer to where I can buy provisions.”

“And how long will you stay there?”