A Daughter of Heth by William Black

CONFESSION AT LAST.

Sunset in the wild Loch Scavaig. Far up amid the shoulders and peaks of Garsven there were flashes of flame and the glow of the western skies, with here and there a beam of ruddy light touching the summits of the mountains in the east; but down here, in the lonely and desolate arm of the sea, the bare and riven rocks showed their fantastic forms in a cold grey twilight. There was a murmur of streams in the stillness; and the hollow silence was broken from time to time by the calling of wild-fowl. Otherwise the solitary scene was as voiceless as death; and the only moving thing abroad was the red light in the clouds. The _Caroline_ lay motionless in the dark water. As the sunset fell the sombre and overshadowing hills seemed to loom larger; the twisted and precipitous cliffs grew more and more distant; while a pale blue vapour gathered here and there, as if the spirits of the mountains were advancing under a veil.