And not for a moment did that young man surmise whence his father came when, on the night in question, M'Adam returned to the Grange, chuckling to himself. David was growing of late accustomed to these fits of silent, unprovoked merriment; and when his father began giggling and muttering to Red Wull, at first he paid no heed. “He! he! Wullie. Aiblins we'll beat him yet. There's many a slip twixt Cup and lip--eh, Wullie, he! he!” And he made allusion to the flourishing of the wicked and their fall; ending always with the same refrain: “He! he! Wullie. Aiblins we'll beat him yet.” In this strain he continued until David, his patience exhausted, asked roughly: “What is't yo' mumblin' aboot? Wha is it yo'll beat, you and yer Wullie?” The lad's tone was as contemptuous as his words. Long ago he had cast aside any semblance of respect for his father. M'Adam only rubbed his knees and giggled. “Hark to the dear lad, Wullie! Listen hoo pleasantly he addresses his auld dad!” Then turning on his son, and leering at him: “What is it, ye ask? Wha should it be but the Black Killer? Wha else is there I'd be wushin' to hurt?” “The Black Killer!” echoed the boy, and looked at his father in amazement. Now David was almost the only man in Wastrel-dale who denied Red Wull's identity with the Killer. “Nay,” he said once; “he'd kill me, given half a chance, but a sheep--no.” Yet, though himself of this opinion, he knew well what the talk was, and was astonished accordingly at his father's remark. “The Black Killer, is it? What d'you know o' the Killer?” he inquired. “Why _black_, I wad ken? Why _black?_” the little man asked, leaning forward in his chair. Now David, though repudiating in the village Red Wull's complicity with the crimes, at home was never so happy as when casting cunning innuendoes to that effect. “What would you have him then?” he asked. “Red, yaller, muck-dirt colour?”--and he stared significantly at the Tailless Tyke, who was lying at his master's feet. The little man ceased rubbing his knees and eyed the boy. David shifted uneasily beneath that dim, persistent stare. “Well?” he said at length gruffly. The little man giggled, and his two thin hands took up their task again. “Aiblins his puir auld doited fool of a dad kens mair than the dear lad thinks for, ay, or wushes--eh, Wullie, he! he!” “Then what is it you do know, or think yo' know?” David asked irritably. The little man nodded and chuckled. “Naethin' ava, laddie, naethin' worth the mention. Only aiblins the Killer'll be caught afore sae lang.” David smiled incredulously, wagging his head in offensive scepticism. “Yo'll catch him yo'self, I s'pose, you and yer Wullie? Tak' a chair on to the Marches, whistle a while, and when the Killer comes, why! pit a pinch o' salt upon his tail--if he had one.” At the last words, heavily punctuated by the speaker, the little man stopped his rubbing as though shot. “What wad ye mean by that?” he asked softly.