Johnston, for here we will be but a
disgraced family."

Henry groaned deeply, and was silent for an instant, then replied: "I
would rather be dead than dishonoured, though I should never see her
again! Had it been yester evening, I would have met the best blade among
these men at arms as blythely as ever I danced at a maypole. But today,
when she had first as good as said, 'Henry Smith, I love thee!' Father
Glover; it is very hard. Yet it is all my own fault. This poor unhappy
Oliver! I ought to have allowed him the shelter of my roof, when he
prayed me in his agony of fear; or; had I gone with him, I should then
have prevented or shared his fate. But I taunted him, ridiculed him,
loaded him with maledictions, though the saints know they were uttered
in idle peevishness of impatience. I drove him out from my doors, whom I
knew so helpless, to take the fate which was perhaps intended for me.
I must avenge him, or be dishonoured for ever. See, father, I have been
called a man hard as the steel I work in. Does burnished steel ever drop
tears like these? Shame on me that I should shed them!"

"It is no shame, my dearest son," said Simon; "thou art as kind as
brave, and I have always known it. There is yet a chance for us. No one
may be discovered to whom suspicion attaches, and where none such is
found, the combat cannot take place. It is a hard thing to wish that the
innocent blood may not be avenged. But if the perpetrator of this foul
murder be hidden for the present, thou wilt be saved from the task
of seeking that vengeance which Heaven doubtless will take at its own
proper time."

As they spoke thus, they arrived at the point of the High Street where
the council house was situated. As they reached the door, and made
their way through the multitude who thronged the street, they found the
avenues guarded by a select party of armed burghers, and about fifty
spears belonging to the Knight of Kinfauns, who, with his allies
the Grays, Blairs, Moncrieffs, and others, had brought to Perth a
considerable body of horse, of which these were a part. So soon as the
glover and smith presented themselves, they were admitted to the chamber
in which the magistrates were assembled.

CHAPTER XX.

A woman wails for justice at the gate,
A widow'd woman, wan and desolate.

Bertha.

The council room of Perth presented a singular spectacle. In a gloomy
apartment, ill and inconveniently lighted by two windows of