"What of that?" queried Balfour, carelessly. "What ingenuity or revenge could suggest more terrible and bloody oppression than has been pressed on Scotland these past ten years?"
"Well, well, what's done can't be undone," said Sir Robert, with a somewhat mournful smile. "Now, lads, we had better to our discussions again. We were but planning a great field meeting for Sabbath week, at which a Communion Service might be held, and we were somewhat divided as to a suitable place of meeting."
"Are there many soldiers in the district?" asked Balfour.
"Ah, that we cannot tell. They rise mysteriously, as it were out of the bowels of the earth, when least expected," replied Sir Robert. "But I heard on good authority that that miscreant--for I can call him nothing else--John Graham of Claverhouse is in the west."
"Right well would I like to measure swords with him," said Balfour, with feverish eagerness. "Such a man is not fit to live."
"It's no' very easy gettin' at him," piped the shrill voice of Watty McBean. "I'm tell he rides a muckle black horse the deevil sent him, an' that nae man can owertak' him."
Balfour immediately turned his piercing eyes on Watty's face with a glance which covered him with confusion, for he had been surprised into speech without thinking.
"Be quiet, Watty," said Adam Hepburn promptly, which rebuke caused Watty to slink behind the door, chiefly to escape the gaze of Balfour, whom he had regarded with terror ever since his entrance.
"Those who are best acquainted with the district should be the fittest to choose a place of meeting," said Balfour. "What numbers have you at Loudon Hill?"
"About three hundred, and at a short notice we could speedily double or treble the number. There having been no fighting of late, very many have returned to their homes. Indeed, those with us are chiefly men whose goods have been confiscated and their dwellings pillaged and burned."