But seeing his deadly intention, Roland spurned him with his right foot; he staggered backward, the blood gushed forth, and at the same moment he rolled over the narrow path, and falling off the blade of the sword, sank heavily into the dark water of the loch, thus being stabbed and drowned almost at the same moment.
Roland uttered a wild laugh, leaped on horseback, and galloped madly away by the base of the castle rock.
Forrester followed at full speed, but the frantic horseman had disappeared like a spirit round the western side of the rock, and even the sound of his horse's hoof's had died away.
At that instant a volley of six arquebuses flashed redly from the parapets of the ravelin, and their bullets whistled about the ears of old Lintstock, who immediately scrambled after Sir John Forrester; but one pierced the brain of the poor page Sabrino, who fell dead on the spot.
The discovery of his body next morning caused unusual consternation in the "good town" of Edinburgh, and the expenditure of several gallons of holy water, which were sprinkled upon the livid corpse and the place where it lay; while the tidings went far and wide that "my Lady of Ashkirk's devil had been found under the castle rock."
CHAPTER LIX.
THE PLACE OF DOOM.
"But when the appointed day was come,
No help appeared nye;
Then woeful, woeful was her heart,
And tears stood in her eye.
And now a fyer was built of wood,
And a stake was made of tree;
And now Queen Elinor forth was led,
A sorrowful sight to see."
Sir Aldrinyar, an old Ballad.
On this night a strange sound floated upward to the Castle of Edinburgh from the city below; it was like the murmur of distant waves, or of the rising wind shaking the branches of a forest. This was occasioned by the crowding of the people towards the Place of Doom, as it was graphically named.
It was a dark midnight, moonless and starless; the eyes of thousands were raised inquisitively to the black, opaque mass of the castle rock and the zone of lofty towers which then engirdled its summit, with their embrasured battlements and frowning cannon.