"Then your blood be upon your own heads!" cried the angry officer, as he banged the door behind him.
The morning of the appointed day arrived. The sisters were calm and strong in their resolution. Suddenly the door of their prison opened. Was it the men come to lead them to the stakes in the stream? Agnes gave a little cry of joy and amaze as she saw the white, worn face of her father.
"My child! my child!" he cried, clasping her in his arms. His emotion was so great that for a moment he could not speak. It was Archie Scott, with a face as white as death, who came and stood before Margaret.
"Agnes is saved," he said hoarsely; "she is not yet sixteen. She is to be released and set in her father's charge. And the Privy Council in Edinburgh, on receiving old Margaret's submission and the memorial sent by Wigton, promised a postponement of the sentence till the King's mind could be known. But the magistrates will not listen. They will hear nothing; they will go on their own way. Thou art to die to-day, Margaret; and I know not how to bear it!"
She laid her hand upon his arm. Her face was full of joy.
"Nay, if Agnes be spared, my prayers have indeed found their answer. For myself—Archie, Archie, do not look so—I have long thought that to depart and be with Christ is far better; where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest."
There was joy and peace in the girl's face as she was led forth from her prison, and old Margaret, too, repenting her former weakness, held her head high, and spoke with courage and resolution to her friends who had assembled to see the mournful procession pass by. All Wigton had come forth to see the martyrs go to their death; and Archie Scott walked near to Margaret, and kept his eyes fixed upon her face, as though to seek to learn something of her spirit.
"Thou wilt be a brother to my sweet Agnes and comfort her," said Margaret to him once. "I trow she will be loyal and true to her faith, even though she may be forced to some outward compliance. The Lord will not judge her harshly!"
It seems sad that such noble and courageous souls as those that animated the martyrs of the Covenant should regard it as a possible offence against God to attend a service to His honour and glory, and by consecrated servants set aside for His service. Perhaps as Margaret Wilson stood in the midst of the waters, bound to her stake, watching the rise of the flood which must soon overwhelm her—perhaps something of the wider and grander aspects of the One Church—Holy and Catholic—with the Lord for her Head was vouchsafed in vision to her spirit. For, suddenly, as she saw the last struggles of the aged woman who was tied on somewhat lower ground, and knew that a few minutes more would see the end of her own young life, she first broke into words of psalm and holy writ, and then suddenly exclaimed:
"The King! the King! the poor misguided King! May God bless and pardon him and open his eyes!"