Margaret was but fourteen years of age at this time, and Archie was not twenty; but the girl had that within her and in her aspect, which made it impossible to regard her as a child. When stories were told of the virgin saints and martyrs of old, it was always Margaret's calm, sweet, young face that rose up before the eyes of the lad, and her resolution and courage in face of a threatened and fearful danger intensified this impression.
As he hurried the girls along towards the place which he knew would be a safe shelter for them and for others, and enable them to join with a party of fugitives whose arrangements were all made, he strove to change the purpose of Margaret, and to seek to win her promise to conform to the laws of the land.
But she shook her head, and the glow in her eyes made them shine like stars in the dusk.
"Nay, Archie, thou must not seek to turn me from the straight and narrow way, even though it be a thorny one to tread! I ask not of thee to follow it. If thou canst serve God and the King too, with a free heart and conscience, then thank God for it, and dwell in peace and safety! For myself I cannot. The Spirit hath shown me a more excellent way, and I needs must follow at all cost. What are the trials and troubles and sufferings of this present life when an eternity of glory lies beyond? 'To him that overcometh will I give——'"
She did not finish the sentence; her mind seemed to travel too swiftly for words. Archie looked at her; and Agnes raised her white, tear-stained face, and both felt that they were looking upon the face of an angel.
The King was dead! The news had reached the north; and for a brief moment the hand of the law was stayed. Persecution of Covenanters was temporarily abandoned till the mind of the new monarch should be known. There were those who shrewdly suspected that where Charles had chastised with whips, James would chastise with scorpions; but for the moment the country breathed again, and many hunted exiles and wanderers crept back to their former homes, to visit their friends and see how they fared, even if they did not mean to remain long.
Archie Scott was returning home from his work one evening, when he met an acquaintance of his, a man for whom he entertained a feeling of deep dislike and distrust, one Patrick Stuart, who seemed always remarkably well informed as to what was in the wind, and to trim his sails accordingly.
"Have ye seen them?" he asked of Archie, with a look of mystery on his sly face.
"Seen whom, man?" asked the other impatiently.