"To their own place," I said, shortly. "But tell me one word. Where is your captain, Gilbert Burnet, that he is not with you to-day?" The man looked at me curiously. "He is gone on another errand, down Tweed toward Peebles." Then I knew he was seeking for Marjory high and low and would never rest till he found her. "I will let you go," said I to the man, "that you may carry the tidings to the rest. Begone with you quick. I am in no mood to look on such as you this day." The man turned and was riding off, when he stopped for one word. "You think," he said, "that I am your enemy and your cousin’s friend, and that I serve under the captain for his own sweet sake. I will tell you my tale. Three years ago this Captain Gilbert Burnet was in Leyden, and there also was I, a happy, reputable man, prosperous and contented, with the prettiest sweetheart in all the town. Then came this man. I need not tell what he did. In a year he had won over the silly girl to his own desires, and I was a ruined man for evermore. I am a servant in his company who worked my fall. Remember then that the nearer I am to Gilbert Burnet the worse it will fare with him." And he rode off, still pale and shivering with terror. I mused for some time with myself. Truly, thought I, Gilbert has his own troubles, and it will go hard with him if his own men turn against him. And I set it down in my mind that I would do my best to warn him of the schemes of the foreigner. For though it was my cousin’s own ill-doing that had brought him to this, and my heart burned against him for his villainy, it was yet right that a kinsman should protect one of the house against the plots of a common soldier. CHAPTER XIII I RUN A NARROW ESCAPE FOR MY LIFE This was in April, and now the summer began to grow over the land. The days grew longer and the air more mild, the flowers came out on the hills, little mountain pansies and eyebright and whortleberry, and the first early bells of the heath; the birds reared their young and the air was all filled with the cries of them; and in the streams the trout grew full-fleshed and strong.