CHAPTER XII.

WHITE HEATHER.


And now behold! the red flag flying from the summit of Castle Dare--a
spot of brilliant color in this world of whirling mist and flashing
sunlight. For there is half a gale blowing in from the Atlantic, and
gusty clouds come sweeping over the islands, so that now the Dutchman,
and now Fladda, and now Ulva disappears from sight, and then emerges
into the sunlight again, dripping and shining after the bath, while ever
and anon the huge promontory of Ru-Treshanish shows a gloomy purple far
in the north. But the wind and the weather may do what they like to-day;
for has not the word just come down from the hill that the smoke of the
steamer has been made out in the south? and old Hamish is flying this
way and that, fairly at his wits' end with excitement; and Janet Macleod
has cast a last look at the decorations of heather and juniper in the
great hall; while Lady Macleod, dressed in the most stately fashion, has
declared that she is as able as the youngest of them to walk down to the
point to welcome home her son.

"Ay, your leddyship, it is very bad," complains the distracted Hamish,
"that it will be so rough a day this day, and Sir Keith not to come
ashore in his own gig, but in a fishing-boat, and to come ashore at the
fishing quay, too; but it is his own men will go out for him, and not
the fishermen at all, though I am sure they will hef a dram whatever
when Sir Keith comes ashore. And will you not tek the pony, your
leddyship? for it is a long road to the quay."

"No, I will not take the pony, Hamish," said the tall, white-haired