The Chieftain Read Free Page A

picnics, the laughter and games. But those things seemed to have gone for ever, and she had not yet found whatever pleasures life now had to offer. Sometimes, now and then, she felt a yearning restlessness, an uneasy longing for something unknown and unrecognised. She had strange dreams, in some of which the Highlander in the orchard played a part, in ways that disturbed and excited her. In her waking hours, she was not bored exactly, but felt all the same that something was missing.
    It rained heavily one Sunday morning about three weeks after the funeral, and Isobel agreed to have her coach brought to the door to convey herself, her parents, and her maid, Janet, to the Kirk for the morning service.
    ‘I’m beginning to fear we’re haunted by Highlanders,’ exclaimed her mother, as her father gave the coachman his orders to move.
    ‘Oh?’ enquired Isobel. The memory of the Highlander in the garden still had power to bring the colour to her cheeks. ‘Why is that?’
    ‘There’s another one skulking out there just now, looking as if he’s up to no good. Did I not tell you of the man who was gazing into the window of Widow Frazer’s shop last Wednesday forenoon? Very odd, for I can’t imagine he had need of ribbons and laces - soap perhaps, by the smell of him, but that’s another matter. They seem to be popping up all over the place wherever I go. I do hope it doesn’t bode ill for us, with all these rumours of that tiresome young man across the water—’
    ‘Och, come now, Margaret my dear, surely to goodness a man can do his shopping in town without giving cause to think the Pretender’s upon us? Maybe he wanted some knick knack for his sweetheart back home. After all, they are but men, if barbarous in dress and behaviour. Clean them and dress them like ourselves and teach them English and give them some education, and you’d scarcely be able to tell the difference. Take John Campbell, for instance—’
    ‘ Oh, John’s quite another matter—And he has passed most of his life amongst us. I don’t think he’d wish to call himself a Highlander now. He would agree with us on that score. No, John now, he’s—’  
    Isobel was glad to listen to the ensuing discussion of John’s virtues, until the church was reached.

    The service was long and the sermon impassioned, and when they emerged at last into the fresh air the rain had long since given way to brilliant sunshine. Isobel would dearly have loved to walk home, but her father bundled them into the coach, saying it was already long past dinner time, and they set off down the street at a steady pace.
    A little further on, the coach rounded a corner and then lurched suddenly, coming to a shuddering halt.
    Andrew Reid put his head out of the window and called to the coachman. After a moment or two of a shouted exchange he drew back and said quickly: ‘There’s been an accident ahead—Some old woman hurt, he thinks—I’ll go and see—Wait here.’
    He scrambled out, closing the door behind him, and disappeared from view.
    ‘Poor old soul!’ murmured Isobel. ‘Do you think we should go and help?’
    ‘Your father will let us know if there’s anything we can do,’ her mother reassured her.
    They waited quietly, talking of nothing in particular, while a few minutes passed. And then all of a sudden the coach quivered, jolted, and started forward at an alarming speed.
    Eyes wide, Isobel clung to the door, crying: ‘Oh, mother, the old woman! Oh, what can he be thinking of?’
    And then she thought she caught a fleeting glimpse of her father, white-faced, horrified, pinned to one side by two rough tartan-clad figures, while behind them a third held a knife to the coachman’s throat.  
    ‘Oh dear God, who is driving? What’s happened?’
    Her mother screamed, and flew to the door, trying to force it open. Isobel grasped her.
    ‘No, no! You’ll be killed at this speed. Oh, sit still, mother dear—Janet, help me!’
    Together they pulled Mrs