"How are you back so soon, Hab? By my faith, I thought you were browbeating the westland Whigs, and roystering at free quarters among the stiffnecked carles of Clydesdale." "And so we were, sir, for three blessed weeks. Cocks' nails! ilka man was lord and master, and mair of the billet he had, loundering the gudeman, kissing the gudewife, and eating the best in cellar and ambrie, and then settling the lawing with a flash of a bare blade or a roll on the drum, as Finland and yourself have dune too. But hech! things are likely to be otherwise; it's a bad sign when the nonconformist bodies begin to cock their bonnets in face of the king's soldiers, as they are doing now." "Ay, 'tis thought there will be the devil to pay between King James and the English, who were ever jealous of the Stuart rule. The Ladies of Bruntisfield are here, are they not?" "Maybe sae, and maybe nae," replied Hab cunningly, still keeping his match cocked. "How!" asked Walter, frowning, upon which Elsie cried in great alarm, "Eh, sirs,--Hab, Hab, ye gomeral, speak the gentleman fair." "To be plain, Mr. Fenton," asked Halbert bluntly, "came ye here as friend or foe?" "A late question, when I am within arm's length of you. Halbert Elshender, I pledge my honour I am here in honest friendship." "And quite alone, sir?' "The deuce! Sirrah, I am as you see," responded Walter impatiently. "Mistress Lilian is here, and her noble kinswoman too, I doubt not." Hab winked knowingly, and knocked on the panels of the vast girnel, the front of which he opened, and the two fugitives forth stepped, pale and agitated. The first sight of Walter's military garb startled them; but bowing profoundly, he said, in the formal fashion of the time, "Lady Bruntisfield, your most obedient humble servant--Mistress Lilian, yours." "Your servant, sir," muttered the ladies, and they all bowed to each other three several times. Lilian blushed deeply. "Ah," said Walter, "I have then the happiness to be remembered." Lady Grisel, on adjusting her spectacles, immediately recognized him, and held out her hand with a smile, in which hauteur, kindness, and timidity were curiously blended. "Welcome, young gentleman; though our fortunes are somewhat clouded now, I rejoice their shadow has not long blighted yours, and I congratulate you on your restoration to liberty." "And I, in turn, wish you every joy at a sudden change of fortune. The decrees of Council are reversed; your lands, your liberty, your coat armorial, are restored, and you are free to return to the ancestral dwelling of your family whenever it pleases you; to cast aside for ever that humble attire, though, believe me, fair Lilian, it never appeared to me so graceful or charming as at this moment."