ers!"

"Ah, I know flickering, too!"

"Is there a great Senor Somebody? Sometimes I feel it--and then there
is only the wild ass in the desert! The dust blinds and the mire
sticks."

"Ah, Old Saracen--"

The other pushed the embers together. "This cave--this glen.... Do you
remember that time we were in Amsterdam and each dreamed one night the
same dream?"

"I remember."

The fire was sinking for the night. The moon was down in the western
sky. Around and around the cave and the glen and the night the inner
ear heard, as it were, a long, faint, wordless cry for help. Alexander
brooded, brooded, his eyes upon the lessening flame. At last, with a
sudden movement, he rose. "I smell the morning air. Let us be going!"

The two covered the embers and left the cave. The moon stood above the
western rim of the glen, the sound of the water was deep and full,
frost hung in the air, the trees great and small stood quiet, in a
winter dream. Ian and Alexander climbed the glen-side, avoiding Mother
Binning's cot. Now they were in open country, moving toward Black
Hill.

The walk was not a short one. Daybreak was just behind the east when
they came to the long heath-grown hill that faced the house, the
purple ridge where as boys they had met. They climbed it, and in the
east was light. Beneath them, among the trees, Black Hill showed roof
and chimney. Then up the path toward them came Peter Lindsay.

He seemed to come in haste and a kind of fear. When he saw the two he
threw up his hands, then violently gestured to them to go back upon
their path, drop beneath the hilltop. They obeyed, and he came to them
himself, panting, sweat upon him for all the chill night. "Mr.
Ian--Laird! Sogers at the house--"

"Ah!"

"Twelve of them. They rade in an hour syne. The lieutenant swears
ye're there, Mr. Ian, and they search the house. Didna ye see the
lights? Mrs. Alison tauld me to gae warn ye--"

CHAPTER XXXV

The soldiers, having fruitlessly searched Black Hill, for the present
set up quarters there, and searched the neighborhood. They gave a wide
cast to that word. It seemed to include all this part of Scotland.
Before long they appeared, not unforeseen, at Glenfernie.

The lieutenant was a wiry, wide-nostriled man, determined to please
superiors and win promotion. He had now men at the Jardine Arms no
less than men at Black Hill. Face to face with the laird of Glenfernie
in the latter's hall, he explained his erran