Rob, unable to fly, was forced to a bravery he did not relish. And so with tightly closed eyes and his head buried under a tuft of grass he prepared for the end. Look at that dreadful sight again he would not. He heard the mad tumult of the flying soldiers--he caught a loud bang like a heavy door clanging to--he listened with trembling limbs to the ghostly melody dying upon the moor. And then back again he caught the sound of footsteps, and he knew that the banshee was come to eat him at its leisure. It was groping across the floor towards him. Now it was touching him. Its hands were as cold as the little officer had said. "Rob!" said Muckle John, shaking him. He uttered a muffled cry partly because of his mouth being so stuffed with grass, partly through the shock of it all, but mostly because it was all so unexpected. Muckle John said nothing but cut him free, and taking the strips of rope threw them on the fire. "Should they ever come back, which will only be by day if at all," he said, "they will know that it ate ye up every scrap. But I'm doubting if they will. Let us make up the fire, Rob, and take our sleep, for there'll be few meddling us awhile." "But how could you do it, Muckle John?" He put some sticks upon the embers and began to eat the remnants of the soldiers' supper. "Did I no say there is always a way, Rob, div ye but find it. There are few places hereabouts that I do not know, Rob, and maybe that's in my favour. But if I was to say that the tombstone is no tombstone at all, and that Macrea is merely a manner of speech, I'll allow I might seem to have deceived ye. But just as the fox, bless him, knows his hiding-place before he sets ahunting, so I, Rob, have made wee preparations long syne. They may come in useful some day, and when I lay hid in that same stone in the year '41 for a private matter, I was glad enough to have taken the precaution." "What was that for?" asked Rob, his head nodding with sleep. But Muckle John only handed him a bannock and a cup of water from the burn. "That would be telling," he said, and wrapping himself up in his plaid he sat blinking at the fire. CHAPTER XIX THE DANCE OF THE MACKENZIES During the mending time of Muckle John's ankle they lay hid in the broken castle, and such a tale was told about the banshee that the place was given a wide berth. Each of the four soldiers related the terrible experience to a dozen other soldiers and those added a trifle of their own and handed it on so that within a day the whole of Fort Augustus knew of it, and soon it was spreading to the searching parties amongst the hills and within a week Edinburgh was posting it down to London. Many, indeed, scoffed at the thing but, as none came to give the banshee a personal test--the desire of Muckle John for absolute quiet was gratified. The castle was treated with profound respect for fully a century afterwards.