id, of something awful; they calls him
Kickan-drubb."

"How strange!" repeated the chieftain, for the hundredth time--"a
regular conspiracy, and nobody here to defend us. The old tiger
down-stairs, Angus Mohr, would be the first to kill us if he could,
and what is to become of us, Heaven only knows."

"Better let the horses stay at the door, sir; the carriage may be
useful," suggested Copus.

"There's no time to be lost, indeed," replied the master; "but yet
what would be the use of flying? We are safer here than on the road."

"No, no; let us go, brother Ben--brother Thomas, I mean--for do you
know that Fash-na-Cairn has vowed he'll have your life?"

"Who the devil is Fash-na-Cairn? I never did him any harm."

"But his clan has been opposed to Ben-na-Groich for hundreds of years.
He'll murder _you_--and _me_!--oh dear! oh dear! he'll force me to be
Mrs Fash-na-Cairn!" Here Miss Alice, overcome by her horrible
imaginings, covered her face with her hands; but whether she wept or
not history does not record.

"Will ye no let a poddy sleep, and be d--d till ye?" again screamed
the shrill voice of Angus Mohr; "hoo mony mair o' ye southron prutes
is coming yammering to the door?"

No answer, apparently, was given to this inquiry, for it was renewed
with bitterer tones than before.

"Fat's a' this o't?--wi' swords and targets, an' the Stuart stripe in
yer plaids. Are ye come to harry ta auld fat man? huigh! hurra! Cot,
an Angus had a dirk himsell, he'd pit it up to the handle in ta fat
cairl's wame."

While these words of encouragement or inquiry were issuing from the
wrathful native, a hurry of steps was heard upon the stairs--the clank
of steel, as if of the crossing of swords, sounded in the passage, and
with a shout, Fash-na-Cairn! Fash-na-Cairn! the parlour door was burst
open, and six wild figures in the full Highland costume rushed in upon
the deliberations of the new chieftain and his household. One of the
party seized the arm of Aunt Alice; another, with a flat-sided blow of
his claymore, laid our heroic friend Copus quietly on the floor; a
third took Jane Somers by the hand as she sat retired in a corner of
the room, and kept guard over her during the whole of the scene; while
the others placed themselves opposite the astonished Ben-na-Groich
himself, and pointed their weapons at his throat without saying a
word.

"What do you want, gentlemen?" said that individual, with a tremor in
his voice that rev