The Black Colonel the Black Colonel

Excerpt: ...be sure, they weren't unknown to me. So I welcomed a letter that reached me next morning from Marget's mother, but I opened it with a dread. It addressed me as Dear Captain Gordon, and it read: I am troubling you for advice, because there is nobody else whom I can ask, and because the matter may interest you, both as a relative, far removed I admit, and as a soldier of the reigning king. You will guess what it is, and that makes it easier for me to explain. It has been made known to us in a round-about, but authoritative way, that it would give King George and his ministers satisfaction to see our house and people established again, and that Jock Farquharson, the laird of Inverey, would be confirmed in the chiefship, if as much were agreeable to my daughter and myself. They don't ask me will I give my daughter in ransom for the house and possessions of our ancestors, but that is what is meant, and you can judge how the idea has concerned me. You may also, however, concern and interest a mother at the same time, and I have hesitated to return a 'No, ' especially as Marget said, about the letter, when I showed it to her, 'Well, the sons of the house have sacrificed enough for it. It may now be the turn of the daughter to sacrifice something . . .! That was dutifully said, but what she expects, I'm certain, is that I shall say the 'No' of my own accord, and I want your advice as to the manner in which it can best be done. I want it at once, because news comes to me, through the early channel of our domestics, that the Black Colonel means to ride over upon us one of these evenings, a friendly call, I suppose. Marget does not know of this intention on his part, and I am not going to tell her, for a mother's instinct naturally wishes to shield a daughter from disturbance. If you would advise me how to say 'No' without bringing further displeasure from high places upon our ruined house, you would be doing us a service. If, besides that, you were to...