he strong hand alone--the Red Hand of
Tyr-owen; and he looked down at the ring of Owen Ruadh and took it for a
symbol, as his ancestors had taken it.

Before they went to rest Turlough pointed out that if the hills were
watched he and his hundred would be noted, so Brian bade him hit back
toward Lough Corrib and then to come straight down upon the main road.
It might be that he could overcome the Dark Master's men of himself, and
if not, he would hold them until Turlough came up.

With this plan arranged, then, the four wagons set forth under the cold
stars, with thirty Scots lying hidden and twenty riding before and
behind. With the first gleam of dawn Turlough and his hundred cantered
off to the northeast, and an hour later Brian and Cathbarr put on the
buff coats and steel jacks of the troopers, with the wide morions; took
a pair of loaded pistols, and galloped after the slow-moving wagons.
Brian wore his Spanish blade, but Cathbarr had sent his ax ahead with
the troopers.

They caught up with the wagons when the latter were entering upon the
road proper out of the hill-track they had followed. The first snows had
vanished for the most part, leaving bleak, gaunt hills and rugged crags
that twisted with soft fog. The sun struck the fog away, however, and as
Brian rode on he gazed up at the purple mountains on his right, and down
at the purple bog to his left, and caught the gleam of the Bertraghboy
water out beyond. He laughed as he drank in the keen air of morning.

"Best get your edge ready, Cathbarr of the Ax!"

Cathbarr grunted, and slung the heavy hammer-ax at his saddlebow. One of
the guides, who were from the Dark Master's twoscore men, pointed to a
twisted peak on their right, whence an almost invisible spiral of gray
smoke wound up.

"The signal, Yellow Brian," he grinned, cheerfully giving away his
secrets. In fact, all those twoscore men rather hoped that their old
master would be crushed by Brian, for so long as there was booty in
sight they cared not whom they served.

Half an hour later Brian saw ahead of him that same bend of road where
first he and Turlough had met O'Donnell Dubh. But there was no sign of
Turlough, and he cantered ahead to see if the O'Donnell men were below.
As he did so a bullet sang past his ear, and he whirled to see half a
dozen of his men go down beneath a storm of lead from the hillsides; at
the same instant some three-score men came scrambling down from among
the rocks-