"What the devil does he mean?" said the first. "We'll detain you as a runaway rebel," said the third. "The boldest of men could not detain me," replied John, now recognising the last speaker, by the moonlight on his face, as well as by his voice. "But for a base traitor like you, Neil MacCallum, better were it for you to be lying dead, like your brave brother, among the slain on Drummosie Moor, than to encounter me here in this churchyard, at such an hour as this!" "In the name of wonder, how knows he my name?" exclaimed MacCallum in a voice that quavered considerably. "Oh, Neil! Neil!" cried the first speaker, in great dismay, "it is no man! it is something most uncanny: For the love of God, parley with it no farther!" "Pshaw--nonsense!" exclaimed the second speaker. "Its a man, and nothing else. Let us all rush upon him at once. Surely, if he were the devil himself, three of us ought to be a match for him." "I am the devil himself!" cried John Smith in a terrible voice, and at the same time stalking slowly forth from the shadow, with the bloody blade of his claymore before him, he strode into the moonlight, which at once fully disclosed his hideous head-gear and ghastly features, to which at the same time it gave a tenfold effect of horror. "Oh, the devil!--the devil!--the devil!" cried the fellows, the moment they thus beheld him; and, overpowered by their terror, they rushed forward towards the churchyard wall, and threw themselves over it pell-mell, tumbling higgledy-piggledy into the road, and scampering out of sight and out of hearing in a moment, leaving John Smith sole master of the field. In the midst of all his miseries, John could not help laughing heartily at the suddenness of their retreat. But gravity of mood came quickly over him again, when he heard his laugh re-echoed--he knew not how, as it were in a tone of mockery, from the old church walls. He began to recollect where he was, and he half repented that he had so indiscreetly used the name of Satan in the manner he had done. "The Lord be about us!" ejaculated John most fervently, whilst his knees smote against each other violently, and his jaws were stretched to a fearful extent. He felt that the shorter time he tarried in that uncanny place the better it would be for his comfort; and, accordingly, he began to move forward as quickly as he could towards a wicket gate, which he well knew gave exit to the footpath at the other end of the churchyard.