I answered him that I was Launcelot Kennedy—and to effectuate something with him I added ’of Kirrieoch.’ For I thought it was unlikely that he would know the hill country well enough to remember that my father was still alive. Which I take to have been an innocent enough deception, in that it hurt no one. And in this I was right, for he answered at once,— ’I am David Crauford the younger of Kerse, but what said you of safe-conducts?’ So I showed him the rings, and told him that my business lay by word of mouth with his father. Thereafter I laid before him the matter of the scoundrels running at me nigh to Dalrymple bridge. Indeed, we could even then see them retiring in a group. ’Let us ride to the bridge head now, and see if they will molest us?’ And this we did, but none stirred nor showed themselves. ’So,’ he said, ’let us ride on to Kerse.’ As we went our way we had much excellent discourse of the news of the countryside, and also of Edinburgh and its customs. I found David Crauford a fine and brave fellow, and regretted heartily that he was not on our side of the blanket—a thing which, indeed, I was too apt to do. I considered it an unfair thing that all the shavelings should be ours, and all the paladins theirs. Yet I was comforted by the thought that it was easier to be distinguished among the men of Cassillis than with Bargany—for in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king, as the saw hath it. Thus we came at last to the place of Kerse. It was a handsome tower, with additions that made it almost a castle, standing upon a rising ground by a loch, and overlooked at a safe distance by some high rocks and scaurs, which David Crauford told me were called the Craigs of Kyle. It was the slowest time of the afternoon when we arrived at the ancient strength, and David, saying that his father might not be wakeful, slipped on ahead, in order to assure me a proper reception—so, at least, he said. And at the doorway I was met by many men-at-arms, with pikes in their hands and feathers in their bonnets. And there came forth to meet me eight of the twelve brothers of Kerse, all bareheaded and with swords at their sides. In the background I could see the cause of my adventuring Currie, the Laird of Kelwood—bowing and smirking like a French dancing-master. But I never so much as looked his way. ’From whom come you, and in peace or war?’ said David Crauford, just as though I had not told him—which was quite right and proper, for these commissions of diplomacy should be carried out with decorum and observance. ’I come,’ said I, ’from the Earl and also from the Tutor of Cassillis, and am commissioned to speak with the Laird of Kerse in their name and on their behalf.’