again. But at the head of what
defensive force did I find myself? Why, a few domestics without
resource enough even to escape from the danger, a dear old lady who
anxiously wanted to mother the trouble about her, and a young woman of
nerve and resolve, my only stand-by.

There, for it was a new discovery in our relationship, I realized that
to have Marget by me was a very welcome comradeship, and, somehow, so
natural, that it made the other things of no burden. I was curiously
happy, and could have left matters at that, but what to do, what to do?

There must, in all of us, be an instinct for our keeping, when we are
in danger. Give it headway and you will probably win through, as a
thirsty horse knows how to reach a springwell among the hills. Argue
with it and it says, "Take your reasoned method, your road of the
better judgment, but don't blame me, your natural guardian, if you come
to harm."

With this I got the strong intuition, possibly communicated to my mind
or heart by Marget's nearness, that here was no ordinary raid for
spoilage. Something else of a personal and intimate sort was behind, I
was sure of it, something to which acute danger attached for my dearest
wishes.

When you are, in small authority, set over the people of a locality,
you are apt to develop a small official mind which obscures the power
of seeing, understanding, divining. Such an attitude, as I had
painfully seen in various parts of the Highlands, fretted the great
sore of defeat that lay upon the Jacobites, whereas the effort should
have been to heal it. My own mind I had tried to keep fresh and free
in all my relationships at Corgarff, impelled, may be, by a nature
which liked, possibly out of vanity, to give sympathy. From this and a
mute speaking with one near and dear, I now had my personal reward, for
I understood. Marget was the trophy sought in this dark raid, and she
was to be the Black Colonel's trophy.

"Action, front!" I said to myself, in one of the drill-book commands.
Offence is always a soldier's best defence, although it is a sailor's
phrase, so I would go out and make a reconnaissance from the back of
the Dower House. This should cause the invaders to show themselves,
and might, if they thought the move stood for any force, even alarm
them into a quiet retreat, which, for several reasons, was what I most
desired.

Quickly I told Marget of my intention, and the need for it, and asked
her to remain on gua