How the three island kings fared in the dark dungeons of the castle of
Rothesay on that fatal night need not be told. Earl Roderic of Gigha had
doubtless in his sea rovings slept on many a less easy couch. But it may
be that in those dark hours of solitude his mind was more disturbed than
were his hardy limbs. He had come to Bute full of a guilty design, by
the fulfilment of which he had hoped to at last gain possession of the
rich dominions that he had coveted for twenty years. His own inheritance
of the small island of Gigha was not enough to satisfy his vaulting
ambition, and the growing power of the King of Norway, who was year by
year extending his territories in the west of Scotland, offered a
further inducement to Roderic, who believed that by slaying his brother
Hamish, and taking his place, he might bring the island of Bute under
the protection of the Norwegian crown.
His design was clumsily planned, for though subtle as a fox, Roderic was
yet an ignorant man, even for those uncultured times, and he had failed
to take into account the two sons of Earl Hamish, both of whom stood
between him and the coveted earldom, and who now appeared to him as an
obstacle not easy to overcome.
But for the unexpected appearance of Kenric, however, even this obstacle
in his path might have been cleared, for he had planned that in the
darkness and quiet of the night he would steal into the sleeping chamber
of Alpin and so deal with him that he would never again waken to claim
his dead father's lands.
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