Johnny scowled at his companions. "Och, you’re both soft in the heed. Everyone kens she’s on a skerry off John O’Groats."
Dougal felt rising discouragement. He’d pledged himself to find Fair Ellen. He’d search every island in the Hebrides if he had to. But carrying his rescued maiden back to Bruard before the end of winter was beginning to look like a dream.
"My nephew met someone who built the tower," Bill said.
"Is that so? The ferryman on Lewis must have met that same cove, but he had a different story," Johnny said doubtfully. "Or it might have been the factor on Jura who told me."
"I suppose ye heard directly?" Dougal asked Jock.
The old man shook his head. "I cannae rightly remember who told me it was Hyskeir. I was drunk at the time, ye ken?"
Johnny snickered. "That sounds likely."
Jock regarded Dougal with a serious expression at odds with the rest of their conversation. "Laddie, I admire your ambition to rescue the lassie. Has it occurred to ye that the stories about her are nothing but whispers in the wind and drifts of Highland mist? I dinnae ken if it’s the same at Bruard, but here on the islands, we hear a grand lot of nonsense. Most of it turns out to be nothing more than a whisky-soaked dream, or an old wives’ tale, or a load of wishful thinking."
"Aye, we hear a few fairy tales dressed up as truth," Dougal said cautiously. "There are plenty of cold winter nights when an outlandish story can sound like fact as well as welcome entertainment."
"Does the plight of Fair Ellen no’ sound like another fairy tale? Think on it, Mr Drummond. The most beautiful lassie in the Highlands is locked away in a tower at the top of a fearsome crag, and only the bravest knight in the kingdom can save her. My granny told me that story when I was a wean, by heaven."
Dougal shifted uncomfortably under the old man’s shrewd eyes. "The fact that it sounds like a fairy story doesnae mean it’s a lie."
"Perhaps no’ a lie, but maybe something of an exaggeration," Bill said, and Dougal hid a wince at the kindness in the man’s voice.
"I feel in my bones that it’s true." He wished he had something a little more concrete to offer his skeptical audience.
"Och, bones can be powerful things," Johnny said. "Right now, mine tell me I’d rather stay here than go annoying innocent holly bushes that never did me a moment’s wrong."
Dougal looked ahead and noticed Kirsty was crossing a field in the distance. He was grateful that the trio of islanders had changed the subject. He wasn’t a fool, although he had a nasty suspicion Bill, Johnny and Jock judged him to be one. The widespread reports of Fair Ellen and the fact that the story seemed to be of recent origin had convinced him of her reality outside the realm of wild Celtic imagination.
"Our Kirsty is set on having our help," Bill said.
"And dinnae forget there’s two rounds in the balance," Jock pointed out.
"Only if she feels like it," Johnny said.
"Johnny, ye ken young Kirsty is a soft touch," Jock said. "She’ll pay our two rounds. Ye ken very well she will."
"Aye, she’s a good lassie, Kirsty." Bill sent Dougal a sly glance. "And I think ye pointed out she’s bonny, too, Mr. Drummond?"
It seemed the subject hadn’t changed after all. Dougal gave an unamused grunt. "Aye, she’s bonny."
"You’d better go after her," Jock said. "She’ll want help with the cutting."
"Are ye no’ coming?"
"We’ll be along in good time," Bill said. "But dinnae wait for us, laddie. Just follow Kirsty across the field and up the brae. From the top, you’ll see the woodland in the glen below."
"Aye, ye cannae miss it, laddie," Johnny said.
Dougal only just stopped himself from shaking his head at the old rogues and their shameless attempts at matchmaking. It was all done so blatantly and with such good humor that he couldn’t be angry. Although if every man who landed on Askaval received the same treatment, he could imagine Kirsty found their antics less amusing. He might have only met her today, but he’d already noticed she was a proud wee thing.
A man who was away on the morning tide could take the locals’ machinations in his stride. In the meantime, he’d promised to help a pretty girl gather Christmas greenery. And Kirsty Macbain was much easier on the eyes than her aging kinsmen.
Chapter 5
Kirsty slipped out of bed to tug her thick flannel nightdress over her head and toss it across a chair. A few moments more, and she was dressed in her shirt and breeches and creeping downstairs and out of Tigh na Mara. She paused to collect the heavy bundle she’d concealed behind the gatepost after dinner.
The fine weather had held, fortunately, although when she stepped outside, she was glad she’d flung a coat over her shoulders before she left the house. Rain wouldn’t have deterred her, but it would make her excursion more uncomfortable. Not to mention that tramping mud into the carpets would make it more difficult to keep her excursion undiscovered.