No one about the premises except Bykes would have been capable of harbouring suspicion of Malcolm; and the head gamekeeper had not the slightest; but, knowing that his lordship found little enough to amuse him, and anticipating some laughter from the confronting of two such opposite characters, he had gone to the marquis with Byke’s report,--and this was the result. His lordship was not a magistrate, and the so-called warrant was merely a somewhat sternly worded expression of his desire that Malcolm should appear and answer to the charge. The accused was led into a vaulted chamber opening from the hall --a genuine portion, to judge from its deep low-arched recesses, the emergence of truncated portions of two or three groins, and the thickness of its walls, of the old monastery. Close by the door ascended a right-angled modern staircase. Lord Lossie entered, and took his seat in a great chair in one of the recesses. “So, you young jackanapes!” he said, half angry, and half amused, “you decline to come, when I send for you, without a magistrate’s warrant, forsooth! It looks bad to begin with, I must say!” “Yer lordship wad never hae had me come at sic a summons as that cankert ted (_toad_) Johnny Bykes broucht me. Gien ye had but hard him! He spak as gien he had been sent to fess me to yer lordship by the scruff o’ the neck, an’ I didna believe yer lordship wad do sic a thing. Ony gait, I wasna gauin’ to stan’ that. Ye wad hae thocht him a cornel at the sma’est, an’ me a wheen heerin’-guts. But it _wad_ hae garred ye lauch, my lord, to see hoo the body ran whan my blin’ gran’father--he canna bide onybody interferin’ wi’ me--made at him wi’ his braid-swoord!” “Ye leein’ rascal!” cried Bykes; “--_me_ feared at an auld spidder, ’at hasna breath eneuch to fill the bag o’ ’s pipes!” “Caw canny, Johnny Bykes. Gien ye say an ill word o’ my gran’father, I s’ gie your neck a thraw--an’ that the meenute we’re oot o’ ’s lordship’s presence.” “Threits! my lord,” said the gatekeeper, appealing. “And well merited,” returned his lordship. “--Well, then,” he went on, again addressing Malcolm, “What have you to say for yourself in regard of stealing my brood pheasants?” “Maister MacPherson,” said Malcolm, with an inclination of his head towards the gamekeeper, “micht ha’ fun’ a fitter neuk to fling that dirt intill. ’Deed, my lord, it’s sae ridic’lous, it hardly angers me. A man ’at can hae a’ the fish i’ the haill ocean for the takin’ o’ them, to be sic a sneck-drawin’ contemptible vratch as tak yer lordship’s bonny hen-craturs frae their chuckies--no to mention the sin o ’t!--it’s past an honest man’s denyin’, my lord. An’ Maister MacPherson kens better, for luik at him lauchin’ in ’s ain sleeve.” “Well, we’ve no proof of it,” said the marquis; “but what do you say to the charge of trespass?” “The policies hae aye been open to honest fowk, my lord.” “Then where was the necessity for getting in over the wall!”