g at the door, he shook his hand at Wakefield, pointing with his
forefinger upwards, in a manner which might imply either a threat or a
caution. He then disappeared in the moonlight.

Some words passed after his departure, between the bailiff, who piqued
himself on being a little of a bully, and Harry Wakefield, who, with
generous inconsistency, was now not indisposed to begin a new combat
in defence of Robin Oig's reputation, "although he could not use his
daddles like an Englishman, as it did not come natural to him." But
Dame Heskett prevented this second quarrel from coming to a head by
her peremptory interference. "There should be no more fighting in
her house," she said; "there had been too much already.--And you, Mr.
Wakefield, may live to learn," she added, "what it is to make a deadly
enemy out of a good friend."

"Pshaw, dame! Robin Oig is an honest fellow, and will never keep
malice."

"Do not trust to that; you do not know the dour temper of the Scots,
though you have dealt with them so often. I have a right to know them,
my mother being a Scot."

"And so is well seen on her daughter," said Ralph Heskett.

This nuptial sarcasm gave the discourse another turn. Fresh customers
entered the tap-room or kitchen, and others left it. The conversation
turned on the expected markets, and the report of prices from different
parts both of Scotland and England. Treaties were commenced, and Harry
Wakefield was lucky enough to find a chap for a part of his drove,
and at a very considerable profit--an event of consequence more than
sufficient to blot out all remembrances of the unpleasant scuffle in the
earlier part of the day. But there remained one party from whose mind
that recollection could not have been wiped away by the possession of
every head of cattle betwixt Esk and Eden.

This was Robin Oig M'Combich. "That I should have had no weapon," he
said, "and for the first time in my life! Blighted be the tongue that
bids the Highlander part with the dirk. The dirk--ha! the English blood!
My Muhme's word! When did her word fall to the ground?"

The recollection of the fatal prophecy confirmed the deadly intention
which instantly sprang up in his mind.

"Ha! Morrison cannot be many miles behind; and if it were an hundred,
what then?"

His impetuous spirit had now a fixed purpose and motive of action, and
he turned the light foot of his country towards the wilds, through which
he knew, by Mr. Ireby's report, th