By noon Edinburgh was some leagues behind, but she pressed on through that day and most of the following night. On the second day after leaving Edinburgh she crossed the Tweed, and came in safety to the home of an old nurse, on the English side, four miles beyond the town of Berwick. "Gude sakes!" cried the old woman, who was standing at her cottage door and was rather astonished to find the horsewoman draw rein, leap to the ground, and plant a kiss on either cheek--"Gude sakes! if it isna Miss Grizel!" "Quickly, into the house!" commanded her young mistress; "I have somewhat to tell that will not wait an hour." She knew the old nurse was to be trusted, and therefore told her story and her secret. "Even now," she said at the end of her story, "the postman is riding from London with the warrant in his bag. I must stop him and make him give it up to me, or my father's head is the penalty. "But what use to talk o' this, when the postman is a stout rider, and armed to boot? How is a mere girl, saving your presence, to do this at all?" "Look here." Grizel unrolled a bundle which she had brought on her saddle-crutch from Edinburgh; it held a horseman's cloak and a brace of pistols. "Now," said she, "where are the clothes of Donald, my foster-brother? He was a slight lad in times syne, and little doubt they'll fit me." For this was indeed the brave girl's plan:--In those times the mail from London took eight days on its journey to Edinburgh; by possessing herself of the warrant for her father's death and detaining it, she could count on the delay of sixteen or seventeen days at least before application could be made for a second, and that signed and sent to the Scotch capital. By this delay, time enough would be won for her friends in London to use all their influence to quash the sentence. It was a mad scheme; but, as she had said, nothing is impossible to a true heart. She had possessed herself, too, of the minutest information with regard to the places where the postmen rested on their journey. One of these places, she knew, was a small inn kept by a widow on the outskirts of the little town of Belford. There the man who received the bag at Durham was accustomed to arrive at about six in the morning, and take a few hours' sleep before going on with his journey. And at Belford, Grizel Cochrane had determined to meet him. Taking leave of her faithful nurse, she rode southwards again, and, timing her pace, drew up before the inn at Belford just an hour after the postman had come in from the south and disposed himself to sleep. The mistress of the inn had no ostler, so Grizel stabled her horse with her own hands, and striding into the inn-parlor, demanded food and drink. "Sit ye down, then," answered the old woman, "at the end of yon table, for the best I have to give you is there already. And be pleased, my bonny man, to make as little noise as may be; for there's one asleep in that bed that I like ill to disturb."