Soon Carlinwark's dappled square of blue gleamed beneath them as they surmounted the Wizard's Mount and looked down upon the reeking chimneys of cottages lying snugly in the bield of the wooded hollow. Never slackening their speed on the summit, they rushed on--Drumclog going down hill among the rabbit-holes and thorn bushes as swiftly and surely as on level pavemented city street. And there at last, by the Three Thorns of a thousand trysts, stood the curate of Dalry, Peter McCaskill, and Jean Gordon by his side with a blue cloak over her arm. A little way behind them could be seen the brawny blacksmith of Carlinwark, Ebie Callan, his sledge-hammer in one hand and the bridle-rein of a chestnut mare in the crook of his left arm. There was as yet no sight or sound of pursuit behind them when they stayed Drumclog. "Hurrah!" said the curate, standing before Wat and Kate in his white cassock and holding his service-book in his hand. "Are your minds made up? There is little time to lose, 'Dearly beloved, forasmuch,' and so on--Walter Gordon of Lochinvar, do you take this woman whom you now hold by the hand (take her by the hand, man)"--so on and on he mumbled, rustling rapidly over the leaves of his book--"before these witnesses? And do you, Katherine McGhie, take this man?--very well then--'whom God hath joined....' There, that is finished, and 'tis as good a job as if it had been done by the Dean of Edinburgh. They cannot break Peter McCaskill's marrying work except with the dagger. And as to that, you must ride to save your skin, Wat, my lad." "Mount upon this good steed, my lady," said the blacksmith to Kate; "she will carry you to Dumfries like the wind off the sea. She is faster than anything this side of the border." And after she had mounted, with Ebie Callan's gallant assistance, Jean Gordon cast the blue cloak about her. "See and draw the hood decently about your head when ye come to the town-end o' Dumfries," she cried. [Illustration: "WITH HIS LOVE BETWEEN HIS ARMS"] "And," said the curate, "mind ye, Black Murdo has a double post-relay of horses prepared for his bride and himself all the road to York, where the king is. Ebie has been ten days away through these outlandish parts layin' them doon. So ye can just say when ye get to the White Horse in the Vennel: 'The horses for my Lord of Barra and his lady,' and there ye are! In the town of Dumfries they do not know Black Murdo frae Black Satan--nor care. And now away wi' ye! I hear them coming, but ye'll cheat them yet. There's nocht in the stables o' Balmaghie that can catch you and your bonny lady if ye keep clear o' moss-holes."