He had indeed engaged himself at Wick for a whaling voyage, but at the last moment had changed his mind and deserted.

For somewhere among the wilds of Rhiconich in Sutherland he had a mother, a wild, superstitious, half-heathen Highland woman, and he wanted to see her.
Coming back to the coast, after his visit, he had stopped a night at a little wayside inn, and hearing some drovers talking of their gold in Gallic, a language which he well understood, he had followed them into the wild pass of Gualon, and there shot them from behind a rock.

For this murder he had been tracked, and was now so closely pursued that he had bribed with all the gold he had a passing fishing-smack to drop him at Stromness during the night.
"She'll gae awa now ta some ither place; 'teet will she! An' she's hungry--an' unco dry;" all of which Sandy emphasized by a desperate and very evil look.
The man was not to be trifled with, and Ragon knew that he was in his power.

If Sandy was taken, he would confess all, and Ragon knew well that in such case transportation for life and hard labor would be his lot.

Other considerations pressed him heavily--the shame, the loss, the scorn of Margaret, the triumph of all his ill-wishers.