rm.

At the byre end the old rowan-trees were creaking and groaning to the
violence of the gale, the bourtree bushes were flattened near to the
ground, and everywhere was white. The driven snow melted on my tongue
as I gasped, and I felt the flakes melt in my eyes; but we followed the
road by instinct, for where the hedges should have been only a black
blur showed. On the low road it was not so bad; but when we took the
hill road again, I fain would have turned my back to the gale, and
stood like a stirk on a wet day, but I powled on after Dan, thinking
shame of my coward heart. Below us the sea roared like a cold, cold,
cruel hell; the maddened anger of the breakers made me shiver with
dread, and the gloating, horrible grumbling as the seas rumbled into
the coves made a cold sweat break on my back and limbs. But I bent my
head before the gale and clawed my way upwards with numbed fingers
clutching like talons to the heather, and prayed that the roots might
hold. So we toiled upwards, Dan always leading, and sometimes I saw
him turning and knew he was speaking; but the wind cut the words as
they left his lips, and bore them tearing and shrieking to the sea
below.

Before we gained the top of the hill I saw Dan climbing upwards from
the old peat track, and I followed dumbly as he led me into an old
quarry, long since disused except by the sheep on the warm summer days,
and there we lay almost exhausted, content just to know that the storm
rushed over our pitiful retreat, and it seems droll to me now that I
spoke scarcely above my breath; but then it seemed as though the
storm-king might hear me if I raised my voice.

But when Dan spoke the black anger was trembling in his voice.

"They're lying there snug and dry in our cove, d---n them, and that
poor _Gull_ straining and crying out there, reaching for her hame, and
them ready to pounce on her crew, the crawling slinks,"--and I knew he
was thinking of the Preventive men.

In a while we crawled to the path again, and clawed our way to the top
of the hill, and there below us was a wondrous sight. The sea ran
inwards in a noble bay, and the bay was almost landlocked with an
island, but down below us was a myriad twinkling lights, hundreds of
them, rising and falling. The snow had taken off for a little, and a
hazy moon hurrying behind grey clouds showed us the ships tossing and
straining at their cables. Some of the lights seemed to move slowly
past the others