Lee looked at all his auditors severally, thoroughly enjoying the effect of this extraordinary news. 'O dear! dear!' cried Clacher weakly, tedding his hair and fidgeting on his seat. 'Naebody daur harm me, I'm mad.' 'Set your mind at rest, Clacher. Nobody will attempt to harm you.' 'Jane,' he continued, 'it was our unfortunate brother whom we carried upstairs this evening. The woman was his wife.' Briscoe gasped; but the practical novelist proceeded, smiling, and proud of his ingenuity. 'He has been going by the name of Lee, Maxwell Lee,' he said, staring down Briscoe; 'and makes a scanty living by his pen. His wife is a noble woman, and will not admit his madness; but that he is mad no one else can have any doubt, because the poor fellow imagines that he is me. I will tell you his whole history tomorrow, as far as I know it. I hadn't the remotest idea he was in Scotland until he appeared to-night----' The droning of a bagpipe not far off, a strange sound at that time of night and in the neighbourhood, interrupted him. A very unskilful attempt at a pibroch succeeded, and as the playing grew more distinct it was evident that the performer approached the house. Muriel raised the window-sash, and the tuneless screaming ceased. Hesitating steps on the gravel were then heard. They stopped opposite the window, and a high, cracked male voice quavered out the first verse of Glen's pathetic ballad, 'Wae's me for Prince Charlie':-- 'A wee bird cam tae oor ha' door, He warbl't sweet an' clearly; An' aye the o'ercome o' his sang Was "Wae's me for Prince Charlie." O! when I heard the bonnie, bonnie bird, The tears came drappin' rarely; I took my bonnet off my head, For well I lo'ed Prince Charlie!' The voice broke entirely at the last line. Said Lee, 'We'll bring this minstrel in,' and left the room. In a few seconds he returned accompanied by a strange figure. It was that of an old man dressed in a ragged Highland costume. His kilt was of the Stuart tartan. His black jacket had been garnished with brass buttons; but of them only a few hung here and there, withered and mouldy; and numerous little tufts of thread on pocket-lids and cuffs and breast showed whence their companions had been shed. His sporran was half-denuded of hair. His hose were holed, and the uppers were parting company with the soles of his shoes. A black feather adorned in a very broken-backed manner his Glengarry bonnet. His pipes he had left in the hall.