He remembered the sudden admission he had made to Granny Stirk in her cottage and told himself that some unseen divinity must have stood by, prompting him. How little did he suspect of the sequel to that day on which he had caught Lady Eliza’s mare; how unconscious he was of the friend standing before him in the person of the little old woman who offered him her apron to dry his hands and said ‘haste ye back’ as he left her door. He had written her a few lines, directing her to go to Whanland and get his room ready, and adding that he wished his return kept secret from everyone but Jimmy, who was to meet the Edinburgh coach at Blackport on the sixth of April. He had no horses in Scotland which could take him from Blackport to Whanland, but he would be able to hire some sort of conveyance from the inn, and, on the road home, he could learn as much as possible of what was happening from the lad. His letter would, in all probability, arrive a day or so in advance of himself, and Granny Stirk would have time to send her grandson to meet him and make her own preparations. Though the Queen of the Cadgers could not read, Jimmy, who had received some elementary schooling, was capable of deciphering his simple directions. It was eight days after leaving Madrid that the fellow-travellers parted at Tours, having met with no delay, beyond the repairing of a wheel which had kept them standing in a wayside village for a couple of hours, and the almost impracticable nature of the roads in the Pyrenees. The official had called in the help of his Government in the matter of post-horses to the frontier, and these, though often miserable-looking brutes, were forthcoming at every stage. Owing to the same influence, a small mounted escort awaited them as they approached the mountains; and the Spaniard’s servants, who occupied a second carriage and had surfeited themselves with tales--only too well founded--of murders and robberies committed in that part of the country, breathed more freely. It was with rising spirits that Speid bade his companion farewell, and, from the window of the inn at which they had passed the night, watched his carriage roll away on the Paris road; he had hired a decent chaise, which was being harnessed in the courtyard below to start on the first stage of its route to Havre, and he hoped to embark from that seaport in three days.