sleepers in all sorts of
attitudes--nay, at the upper table, the flushed, debauched, though young
and handsome, faces of Robert and Alexander Stewart might have been
detected among those who lay snoring among the relics of their last
night's revel.

The old steward was, however, up and alert, ready to offer the stirrup-
cup, and the horses were waiting in the court; but what they had by no
means expected or desired was that Duke Murdoch himself, in his long
furred gown, came slowly across the hall to bid his young kinsman Kennedy
farewell.

'Speed you well, my lad,' he said kindly. 'I ask ye not to tarry in what
ye must deem a graceless household;' and he looked sadly across at his
two sons, boys in age, but seniors in excess. 'I would we had mair lads
like you. I fear me a heavy reckoning is coming.'

'You have ever been good lord to all, Sir,' said Kennedy, affectionately,
for he really loved and pitied the soft-hearted Duke.

'Too good, maybe,' said Murdoch. 'What! the scholar goes with you?' and
he fixed a look on Lily's face that brought the colour deep into it under
her hood.

'Yes, Sir,' answered Kennedy, respectfully. 'Here, you Tam,' indicating
Malcolm, 'take him behind you on the sumpter-horse.'

'Fare ye weel, gentle scholar,' said Murdoch, taking the hand that Lily
was far from offering. 'May ye win to your journey's end safe and sound;
and remember,' he added, holding the fingers tight, and speaking under
the hood, 'if ye have been hardly served, 'twas to make ye the second
lady in Scotland. Take care of her--him, young laddie,' he added,
turning on Malcolm: ''tis best so; and mind' (he spoke in the same
wheedling tone of self-excuse), 'if ye tell the tale down south, nae ill
hath been dune till her, and where could she have been mair fitly than
beneath her kinsman's roof? I'd not let her go, but that young blude is
hot and ill to guide.'

An answer would have been hard to find; and it was well that he did not
look for any. Indeed, Malcolm could not have spoken without being heard
by the seneschal, and therefore could only bow, take his seat on the
baggage-horse, and then feel his sister mounting behind him in an
attitude less unfamiliar on occasion even to the high-born ladies of the
fifteenth century than to those of our day. Four years it was since he
had felt her touch, four years since she had sat behind him as they
followed the King to Coldingham! His heart swelled with thankfulnes