find a magistrate in this beastly place,--"

"You would tell him I emptied your gun because you threatened me
with it!"

"You were going off with my bag!"

"Because I undertook to carry your bag, was I bound to endure your
company?"

"Alister!" said a quiet voice out of the darkness.

The highlander started, and in a tone strangely tremulous, yet with
a kind of triumph in it, answered--

"Ian!"

The one word said, he stood still, but as in the act to run, staring
into the darkness. The next moment he flung down the game-bag, and
two men were in each other's arms.

"Where are you from, Ian?" said the chief at length, in a voice
broken with gladness.

All Valentine understood of the question, for it was in Gaelic, was
its emotion, and he scorned a fellow to show the least sign of
breaking down.

"Straight from Moscow," answered the new-comer. "How is our mother?"