"But Dick knew better. For when we went down and peeped at the keyhole, he heard us, and called on us all to come our ways in. And--you will never guess in a thousand years--he had routed a flag out of his sea-chest. The 'Wicked Flag' it was,--the pirates' flag--black, with the Death's Head and cross-bones done in white upon it, the same that he had hoisted on seas where no questions were asked, when he commanded the old _Golden Hind_. And wrapping himself in that, he said, 'Tell old Israel that I died _so_!' And we, thinking it was, as one might say, braving the Almighty and his poor old servant, kept silence. And then he shouted, 'Promise, ye white-livered rascals, or I've strength to slit your wizzards yet. Tell him I died under the Black!' "And Bridget, who was feared herself, said, 'Whist, for God's sake, do not bring a curse on the house!' "And then he just cursed the house from flooring to roof-tree, and so went to his own place! "Dead? Well, yes--dead and buried is old Dickie Wilkes. But poor Israel Kinmont is quite brokenhearted. He says that Dick was the first that ever broke away, and that he is not long for this world himself now that he has lost Dick. It was always cut-and-come-again when you were converting Dick. "But Israel has an explanation, poor old fellow. "'It was not Grace that missed fire,' he says, 'but me, the unworthy marksman. And for that I shall be smitten like the men who, with unanointed eyes, looked on the ark of God that time it went up the valley from Ekron to Bethshemish, with the cows looking back and lowing for their calves all the way. I were always main sorry for them cows!' old Israel says." [Footnote 2: Harvest home merrymakings.] CHAPTER XL THE GREAT "TABERNACLE" REVIVAL Though Boyd Connoway had not said anything directly threatening the house of Heathknowes or its inmates, his story of his own "conversion" and the death of Dick Wilkes under the Black Flag somehow made us vaguely uneasy. The door of the house was locked at eight. The gates of the yard barricaded as in the old time of the sea raids from the _Golden Hind_. So strong was the feeling that Irma would gladly have returned before our time to the little White House above the meadow flats, and to the view of the Pentlands turning a solid green butt towards the Archers' Hall of the Guid Toon of Edinburgh.