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understand me. I tried again, in his own tongue. ‘
Uisdean? Cait a bheil Seoras?
’
    This time, he understood. He seemed to have great difficulty in moving his tongue, and the words that he eventually produced were difficult to make out: ‘
Chan eil fios agam. Chan eil fios agam
.’ Tears were in his eyes as he looked desperately at me over the shoulder of the man dragging him away.
I do not know
.

3
The Drummer Boy
    It was nearly eight o’clock that evening before I finally arrived home, by which time Hugh Gunn had been safely returned to the college and placed under the care of Peter Williamson, whose remorse at what he saw as his dereliction of duty towards Hugh and Seoras was very great. He insisted on caring for the rambling boy himself.
    I had been unable to learn anything further of Hugh’s experience, or Seoras’s fate, occupied as I was with my class all afternoon. Before supper, I had accompanied Dr Barron, Professor of Divinity in the college, to a meeting of the ministers of all the kirks in Aberdeen, and had dined with them afterwards. It seemed hardly possible even now when I thought about it, but ten years on from the greatest disappointment of my life, from my public disgrace at a meeting of the presbytery of Fordyce, I was on the point of being called to the charge of the East Kirk of St Nicholas in Aberdeen. At the age of thirty-five, I was finally to attain to that thing I had wished for my whole life – by Christmas, I would be preaching the Word to the people of Aberdeenas a minster of the Kirk of Scotland. Dr Dun had preparations well in hand for my replacement as regent of the highest class at Marischal College, and was gradually releasing me to other duties in the town, more commensurate with my new status.
    Also more in keeping with the standing of a minister of the kirk, my family was to move to a new home, on the Gallowgate, a larger and grander house than the little cottage on Flourmill Lane that my friend William had leased to me at a derisory rent for the last seven years, since my marriage to Sarah. There were six weeks yet until we were to shift, but Sarah was already busy making preparations for the move. I expected to find her engaged in some spinning or needlework when I arrived home. Instead, what I found was a house with an atmosphere more chill than that I had just stepped in from, the two younger children lying awake but silent in their bed, my wife staring defiantly at a neglected fire, and our older son, Zander, nowhere to be seen. On the floor at Sarah’s feet were two wooden drumsticks, snapped in half.
    Nobody spoke as I walked over to pick up the broken toys. I looked from them to my wife, but she studiously avoided my eye. ‘What has happened here?’ I asked. ‘Where is Zander?’
    ‘He is upstairs, where I sent him. Had you asked that question two hours ago, you would have had a different answer.’ She was determined I would drag it out of her. There was nothing to do but oblige.
    ‘Why?’
    At last she looked at me. ‘Because he was not here. He did not come home until well after seven, when William Cargill brought him and James from the harbour.’
    I put a hand on her shoulder to reassure her. ‘I’m sorry he missed his supper, and I’m sure he will be sorrier, but you know, it is a natural thing for boys of nine to forget to go straight home after school. I did it often enough myself, and even a boxed ear and an empty stomach failed to remind me the next time there was something more interesting to do. I suspect they had gone down to look at the troop ship.’
    She shook my hand from her shoulder and I saw fire in her eyes as her head swung round towards me. ‘That is exactly where they went. Down to look at the troop ship. That boy has nothing in his head but the war and going to be a soldier. He has no talk but of marching and sieges and guns and colours. And all your talk of Matthew Lumsden and Archie Hay has not helped – Matthew is forever at the