“The craft is, then,” Father Urquhart went on, “that we shall destroy this English company with sword or arrow, but with no alarm of culverins or cannon. Meanwhile, some five score of you will put on to-night the red cross of St. George, with plain armour, so that the English shall mistake you for their own men returning from the sally, and some few men in our own colours and coats you will hale with you as prisoners. And, if one of you can but attire himself in some gear of the Maid’s, with a hucque of hers, scarlet, and dight with the Lilies of France, the English gate-wards will open to you all the more eagerly.”
“By the bones of St. Boswell!” cried Randal in his loud voice, but the good Father put a hand on his mouth.
“Quiet, man!” he said.
“By the blessed bones of St. Boswell,” Randal said again, as near a whisper as he could attain to, “the lady of the linen-basket shall come as the Maid. We have no man so maidenly.”
They all shouted, laughing, and beating the tables with hands and tankards.
“Silence!” cried Robin Lindsay.
“Nay, the louder we laugh, the less will any suspect what is forward,” said Randal Rutherford.
“Norman, will you play this part in the mumming?”
I was ashamed to say no, though I liked it not over well, and I nodded with my head.
“How maidenly he blushes!” cried one, and there was another clamour, till the walls rang.