The Pride of Lions Read Online Free PDF Page B

horde of naked, hairy-legged creatures charging at you across a battlefield like bloody fiends out of hell—screaming and flailing those great bloody swords and axes of theirs like scythes? Not savages? They hardly know an intelligible word of the King’s English, for pity’s sake, and spend all their waking moments plotting thievery and murder on their neighbors.”
    “We should recall the army from Austria, I say,” a gentleman strolling past the group interjected. “If law and loyalty cannot be brought to them by persuasion and logic, then by God we should carry it there by musket, bayonet, and gibbet.”
    “Hear, hear,” came the general consensus.
    “In truth”—a thin, nervous-looking guest adjusted his pince-nez and thrust a finger forward to insert a comment—“the clans are quite ferocious in their loyalty and strictly law-abiding within their own sects. They regard their chief as father, magistrate, juror, even somewhat of a king with inherited rights and powers that the lowest of the tacksmen would not dream of disobeying.”
    “What the devil are you on about, Faversham? You consider yourself an authority because you have spent some months up there plotting maps?”
    “Good gracious, no, not an authority. It would require a born-and-bred Scotsman to fully understand the way a fellow Scotsman thinks. But I must confess my opinions of them in general were forced to change somewhat after having traveled the length and breadth of the country.”
    “And now you mean to convince us they are amiable, honorable hosts?”
    The sarcasm caused the little man to adjust his spectaclesagain. “Actually, they were most hospitable, indeed, once they determined I was there for peaceful, scientific reasons only. As to their honor, I made the unknowing error of intimating to one particular chief that some of his people had not behaved toward me with the civility I had come to expect. Damn if he didn’t clap a hand to his sword and say that, if I required it, he would send me two or three of their heads for the insult. I laughed, thinking it a jest, but the chief insisted he was a man of his word, and … faith … I believe he would have done it.”
    “You use this as an example to demonstrate their degree of civility?” Lieutenant Garner’s mouth curved sardonically. “I should think it better illustrates their baser instincts to be so ready to sever a man’s head from his shoulders.”
    “Perhaps I have explained it poorly, then,” Faversham said in defense. “I meant only to show that to a Scotsman—and to a Highlander in particular—honor is everything.”
    “Show me a Highlander,” Lieutenant Garner countered dryly, “and I’ll show you a thief.”
    “I do not recall that I ever lost anything among them but a pair of gloves—and that I owed to my own carelessness.”
    “You sound as if you harbor some respect for them, sir.”
    “Respect, Lieutenant? If anything, I find it prudent to respect that which is so simple and basic it cannot be ignored. Or destroyed.”
    “Hah!” Colonel Halfyard slapped Faversham so soundly on the shoulder, his pince-nez jumped off his nose. “There you have it. By our own admission—simpletons!”
    While the others laughed and applauded the colonel’s wit, the cartographer fumbled to reseat his pince-nez. “No, no. I meant simple in its purest and strictest sense. Honor, to a Highlander, is honor. There are no wherewithals, no provisions for exception. They swear their oaths before God and man, sealing them with their lips placed upon a dirk. Should they ever break that oath, theyaccept the fact that they forfeit their lives to the steel of that same knife. How can one not respect such stalwart faith?”
    “Are you now saying, sir, that because they kiss knives and show a willingness to have their hearts impaled for telling little white lies”—Garner’s voice dripped with sarcasm—“that we should tremble in fear and do nothing if they decide to