"Whom have we here?" said she, as she communed with herself, and nodded her head, still apparent through the loophole. "By'r Lady! neither Gascon nor Fleming, or my eyes are no better than my father's, when he looks at _antiques_ through the red medium of his vintage of '90. Perchance, a lover come to run away with Kate Kennedy. Hey! the thought tickles my wild wits, and sends me on the wings of fancy into the regions of romance. Yet I have not read that the catching and carrying off of _Tartars_ hath anything to do with the themes of romantic love-errantry. I'm witty at the expense of this poor packman; but, seriously, Katherine Kennedy must carry off her lover. True to the difference that opposes me to the rest of my sex, I could not love a man whom I did not vanquish and abduct, as a riever does the chattels of the farmer." Continuing her gaze, as she laughed at her own strange thoughts, she saw the merchant bind his mules to a ring fixed in the inside of the wall, and take out of his panniers a vessel, with which he proceeded in the direction of the door that led to the hall. When the merchant had disappeared, she saw one of the retainers of the castle examining intently the mules and their panniers. He looked up and caught her eye; and placing his finger on his forehead, made a sign for her to come down. She obeyed with her usual alacrity, and in a moment was at the side of the retainer, who, slipping gently under the shade of the castle, so as to be out of the view of those within the hall, communicated to the ear of Katherine some intelligence of an important nature. The man looked grave; Kate snapped her fingers; the fire of her eyes glanced from the balls like the sparks of struck flint, and the expression of her countenance indicated that she had formed a purpose which she gloried in executing. "Hark ye, Gregory," said she; "I am still your debtor, but I require again your services." And, looking carefully around her, she whispered some words into the ear of the man; and, upon receiving his nod of intelligence and assent, sprung up the steps that led to the hall. The wine merchant was, as she entered, sitting at the oaken table, opposite to the old baron, who was holding up in his hand a species of glass jug, and looking through it with that peculiar expression which is only to be found in the face of a luxurious wine-toper in the act of passing sentence. "Wha, in God's name, are ye, man?" cried the baron, under the cover of whose speech Kate slipped cleverly up to the window, and sat down, with her cheek resting on her hand, in apparent listlessness, but eyeing intently the stranger. "I could have wad the picture o' my ancestor, Watt o' Flodden, or King Henry's turret, in the east wing o' Innerkepple, wi' its twenty wounds, mair precious than goold, that there wasna a cup o' vintage '90 in Scotland except what I had mysel. Whar got ye't, man? Are ye the Devil? Hae ye brocht it frae my ain cellars? Speak, Satan!"