“But as I need not tell you, a very strong man is a very weak man. And so they trapped him, William Boyd, who called himself his friend, being the traitor. For my father had known him in Holland and aided him with money and providing when he studied as one of the lads of the Hill-folk at the University of Groningen. “Now this a man like William Boyd could not forgive--neither repay. But in silence he hated and bode his time. For, though I am but young, I see that nothing breeds hate and malice more readily than a helping hand extended to a bad man. “So devising evil to my father in secret, he met him at the Clachan of Saint John as he came home from the market at Kirkcudbright, where he had been dining with Kenmure and my Lord Maxwell. Quintin, you know how it is with my father when he comes home from market--he is kind, he is generous. The world is not large enough to hold his heart. Wine may be in, but wit is not out. “So Alexander Gordon being in this mood, Boyd and two or three of his creatures met him in the highway. “My father had oftentimes thwarted and opposed Boyd. But now his stomach was warm and generous within him. So he cried to them, ‘A fair good e’en to ye, gentlemen.’ “Whereat they glanced cunningly at one another, hearing the thick stammer in my father’s voice. “‘And good e’en to you, Earlstoun!’ they answered, taking off their hats to him. “The courtesy touched my father. It seemed that they wished to be friends, and nothing touches a big careless gentleman like Alexander Gordon more than the thought that others desire to make up a quarrel and he will not. “So with that he cried, ‘Let us bury bygones and be friends.’ “‘Agreed,’ answered Boyd, waving his hand jovially; let us go to the change-house and toast the reconciliation in a tass of brandy,’ “This he said knowing that my father was on his way from market.” “For this,” said I, not thinking of my place and dignity, “will I reckon with William Boyd.” Mary Gordon went on without noticing my interruption. “So though my father told them that he could not go, that his wife waited for him by the croft entrance and that his daughter was coming down the water-side to meet him, yet upon their crying out that he must not be hen-pecked in the matter of the drowning of an ancient enmity, my father consented to go with them.” Mary Gordon looked before her a long time without speaking, as though little liking to tell what followed. “They knew,” she said, “that he was to preside that night at a meeting of the eldership and commissioners of the Hill-folk. So they brought him as in the change-house they had made him to the meeting.” There was a long silence. “And this was all?” I asked. For the accusation which had come to me had been far graver than this. “As I live and must die, that is all. The other things which they testify that he did that night are but the blackness and foulness of their own hearts.” “I will go speak with him,” I said, moving as to pass on.