so galloped back to the
garrison at the Clachan of St. John.

MacMichael sat down, panting as with honest endeavour. He wiped his brow
with calm deliberation.

"An' troth," he said, "I think ye warna the waur o' Black MacMichael an'
Rob Grier's Gallowa' flail."

Yet there was not even thankfulness in our hearts, for we found
ourselves mixed yet more deeply in the fray. Not that this broil sat on
us like that other business of the dead spy behind the heather bush. For
these men fell in fair fighting, which is the hap of any man. But we saw
clearly that we should also be blamed as art and part in the killing of
the spy, and the thought was bitter gall to our hearts.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

THE FIGHT IN THE GUT OF THE ENTERKIN.

All the next two days we were gathering for the rescue of Maisie and her
father, finding, as we went eastward, men whose hearts were hot within
them because of the oppression. But we found not place nor opportunity
till the third day. It was the night of the second day that I stole down
to the little village of Carron Bridge, which stands by the brink of a
dashing, clean-running stream, where the troops were encamped. There I
managed to get speech of Maisie Lennox. I clambered down one bank and up
the other. And because the houses stood over the brawling of the stream,
the soldiers on guard heard me not. I went from window to window till,
by the good hap of love (and the blessing of God), I found the window of
the room within which Maisie Lennox was confined.

I cried to her through the dark, low and much afraid. "Maisie May!" I
called as in old days at the Duchrae, when I used to carry her on my
back, and she in sportiveness used to run and hide from me.

She was not asleep, for I heard her say plainly, like one speaking from
a bed:

"It is a dream--a sweet dream!" But nevertheless I knew that she sat up
and listened.

"Maisie May!" I said again at the window, very softly.

I heard her move, and in a moment she came to the lattice, and put her
hand on the sill.

"Oh, William!" she said, "is it indeed you and not a dream?"

"It is even William Gordon!" I said, sorry that I could not do more than
touch her fingers through the thick bars of the guard-house.

"You must go away at once," she said; "there are three soldiers sleeping
no further off than the door."

"We will rescue you to-morrow, Maisie," I said.

"And get yoursel's killed!" she said. "Do not try it, for my sake."