MacDonald's voice answered, so near that for an instant the automatic flashed in the moonlight.

Aldous stepped out where the trail had widened into a small open spot.

Half a dozen paces from him, in the bright flood of the moon, stood Donald MacDonald.
The night, the moon-glow, the tense attitude of his waiting added to the weirdness of the picture which the old wanderer of the mountains made as Aldous faced him.

MacDonald was tall; some trick of the night made him appear almost unhumanly tall as he stood in the centre of that tiny moonlit amphitheatre.

His head was bowed a little, and his shoulders drooped a little, for he was old.