Ronan was about to add more, when Sir Hector McBlane approached the mound of bricks, which was already breast high, and, looking straight at him, exclaimed:
“Robert Dunloe, it is useless to try and hoodwink us. We know all about you. We know that you were once arrested for highway robbery and murder, but got off through turning King’s evidence against your mate, ‘Hal of the seventeen strings,’ who was hanged at Lancaster; that you then, took up Government spying as a trade, and got a score of the best fellows who ever breathed life sentences at Morecombe for smuggling a few casks of brandy. A month ago we heard that you were coming to Annan to try and place a rope round some of our necks for the same so-called felony, and we determined that we would be first in the field and teach you a lesson. We are now going to seal you up and leave you to soliloquise over the rope which is round you, and which is, doubtless, of the same hue and texture as that which has hanged the many that have been sentenced through your treachery. Adieu.”
It was in vain, when Sir Hector had finished speaking, that Ronan alternately pleaded and swore; he could get no further reply. The layers of bricks rose, till only one was left to render the task complete; and already the air within was becoming fetid and oppressive. A terrible sense of utter and hopeless isolation now surged through Ronan, and forced him once again to call out:
“For the love of God,” he said, “set me free. For the love of God.”
He had barely uttered these words, when the whole assembly looked at one another with startled faces.
“Hark!” exclaimed one. “Do you hear that screaming and clapping? What in the world is it?”
“I should say,” said another, “that it was some puir bairn being done to death were it not for the clapping, but that gets over me. Whatever can it mean?”
At that moment steps were heard descending the stairs in a great hurry, and a young man, with bright red hair, and dressed strictly in accordance with the fashion prevailing at that time, burst into the room.
“Boys,” he exclaimed, his voice shaking with emotion, “I have just seen the Banshee. She was in the road outside the gates of this house, running backwards and forwards, just as I saw her five years ago in Kerry, and, as I tried to pass her by to get on my way to Dumfries, she waved me back, shaking her fist and screaming at the same time. Then she signalled to me to come here, and ran on ahead of me, crying, and groaning, and clapping her hands. And as I knew it would be as much as my life is worth to disobey her, I followed. You can still hear her outside, keening and screeching. But what are all these bricks for, and this mortar?”
“The informer, Robert Dunloe,” exclaimed one of the revellers. “We have been bricking him up for a lark, and intend keeping him here till the morning.”