ss. And here was brooding thought again!

Two more days passed. The man from the hut below in the pass came at
dusk with food carefully sent from the chieftain's hall. Redcoats had
gone indeed through the glen, but they could never find the path to
this place! They might return or they might not; they were like the
devil who rose by your side when you were most peaceful! Angus went
down the mountain-side. The sound of his footstep died away. Ian had
again Solitude herself.

Another day and night passed. He watched the sun climb toward noon,
and as the day grew warm he heard a step upon the hidden path. With a
pistol in either hand he moved, as stealthily, as silently as might
be, to a platform of rock that overhung the way of the intruder. In
another moment the latter was in sight--one man climbing steadily the
path to the old robber fastness. He saw that it was Glenfernie. No one
followed him. He came on alone.

Rullock put by his pistols and, moving to a chair of rock, sat there.
The other's great frame rose level with him, stepped upon the rocky
floor. Ian had been growing to feel an anger at solitude. When he saw
Alexander he had not been able to check an inner movement of welcome.
He felt an old--he even felt a new--affection for the being upon whom,
certainly, he had leaned. There flowed in, in an impatient wave, the
consideration that he must hate....

But Glenfernie hated. Ian rose to face him.

"So you've found your way to my castle? It is a climb! You had best
sit and rest yourself. I have my sword now, and I will give you
satisfaction."

Glenfernie nodded. He sat upon a piece of fallen rock. "Yes, I will
rest first, thank you! I have searched since dawn, and the mountain is
steep. Besides, I want to talk to you."

Ian brought from his cupboard oat-cake and a flask of brandy. The
other shook his head.

"I had food at sunrise, and I drank from a spring below."

"Very good!"

The laird of Glenfernie sat looking down the mountain-sides and over
to far hills and moving clouds, much as he used to sit in the crook of
the old pine outside the broken wall at Glenfernie. There was a trick
of posture when he was at certain levels within himself. Ian knew it
well.

"Perhaps I should tell you," said Alexander, "that I came alone
through the pass and that I have been alone for some days. If there
are soldiers near I do not know of them."

"It is not necessary," answered Ian. While he spoke he saw in a flash