I put up that night in a shepherd’s cottage miles from anywhere.  The man was called Macmorran, and he had come from Galloway when sheep were booming.  He was a very good imitation of a savage, a little fellow with red hair and red eyes, who might have been a Pict.  He lived with a daughter who had once been in service in Glasgow, a fat young woman with a face entirely covered with freckles and a pout of habitual discontent.  No wonder, for that cottage was a pretty mean place.  It was so thick with peat-reek that throat and eyes were always smarting.  It was badly built, and must have leaked like a sieve in a storm.  The father was a surly fellow, whose conversation was one long growl at the world, the high prices, the difficulty of moving his sheep, the meanness of his master, and the godforsaken character of Skye.  ’Here’s me no seen baker’s bread for a month, and no company but a wheen ignorant Hielanders that yatter Gawlic.  I wish I was back in the Glenkens.  And I’d gang the morn if I could get paid what I’m awed.’

However, he gave me supper—­a braxy ham and oatcake, and I bought the remnants off him for use next day.  I did not trust his blankets, so I slept the night by the fire in the ruins of an arm-chair, and woke at dawn with a foul taste in my mouth.  A dip in the burn refreshed me, and after a bowl of porridge I took the road again.  For I was anxious to get to some hill-top that looked over to Ranna.

Before midday I was close under the eastern side of the Coolin, on a road which was more a rockery than a path.  Presently I saw a big house ahead of me that looked like an inn, so I gave it a miss and struck the highway that led to it a little farther north.  Then I bore off to the east, and was just beginning to climb a hill which I judged stood between me and the sea, when I heard wheels on the road and looked back.

It was a farmer’s gig carrying one man.  I was about half a mile off, and something in the cut of his jib seemed familiar.  I got my glasses on him and made out a short, stout figure clad in a mackintosh, with a woollen comforter round its throat.  As I watched, it made a movement as if to rub its nose on its sleeve.  That was the pet trick of one man I knew.  Inconspicuously I slipped through the long heather so as to reach the road ahead of the gig.  When I rose like a wraith from the wayside the horse started, but not the driver.

‘So ye’re there,’ said Amos’s voice.  ’I’ve news for ye.  The Tobermory will be in Ranna by now.  She passed Broadford two hours syne.  When I saw her I yoked this beast and came up on the chance of foregathering with ye.’

‘How on earth did you know I would be here?’ I asked in some surprise.

‘Oh, I saw the way your mind was workin’ from your telegram.  And says I to mysel’—­that man Brand, says I, is not the chiel to be easy stoppit.  But I was feared ye might be a day late, so I came up the road to hold the fort.  Man, I’m glad to see ye.  Ye’re younger and soopler than me, and yon Gresson’s a stirrin’ lad.’