"But as I was running by, he grippit me with one hand and drew his windlestrae of a sword wi' the other--drew it on a pair o' lassies, mind ye. Then what think ye? Your bit lassie there, Missie Mim, she flew on him like a wullcat and gripped the blade atween her fingers till she drew it oot o' his hand. Then she took it across her knee and garred it play _snap_ like a rotten branch. Syne ower it gaed intil the water. And that was the way she got the cut on her hand, poor thing." Then I gave a great shout and clasped Maisie in my arms, yet not harshly, lest she should be weak. I was glad to hear this testimony to her bravery. "That is of a better fashion," said Kate, like one who has store of experience. Then she went on with her story, for she had yet more to tell. "But the loon was dour for a' the want o' his sword, and we micht no' hae mastered him but that he tried to trip us and so got tripped himself. He fell so that the head o' him took the wa' and fair dang him stupid. So we e'en gied him a bit hoise an' ower he gaed intil the water----" "Mercy on us," I cried, "ye didna droon the man?" "Droon him," said Kate, "deil a fear! Yon chiel is made for the tow. He'll droon nane. The last we saw o' him, he was sitting on his hurdies in the shallows, up to his neck in the water, trying what banes war hale after his stramash. "So," continued Kate, "we gaed our roads in peace, and the chiel sat still in the water, thrawin' his heid aboot and aboot like a turnspit, as lang as we could see him." Even thus Kate McGhie told her tale, making my lass dearer to me with every word. Of Mardrochat the informer, who had made bold to meddle with them, I had heard many times. He had been a Covenanter of zeal and forwardness till, at a meeting of the Societies, his double-faced guile had been laid bare. Ever since which day in the wilds of Friarminion, he had been a cunning, spying fox, upon the track of the hill-folk. But I knew how dangerous the man could be, and liked it ill enough that the maids should have crossed him so early on their pilgrimage. I doubted not that it was from him that the original information had come, which, being carried to the enemy by Birsay and overheard by me in the house of Balmaghie, had sent us all hiving to the mountains. CHAPTER XLI. THE HOUSE OF THE BLACK CATS.