"Anything more?"
"Odslife! I think that was enough to see before breaking one's fast; and then their heads were spiked, where six others girn, on the Bristo Porte."
"Goose! I would thine was with them; for the news I seek oozes out of thee like blood-drops."
"And there was an Irish leper woman branded by a hot iron on both cheeks, for returning uncleansed to her own house in St. Ninian's Row."
"Oh, Westmains, my heart is heavy!" said the lady, seating herself after a pause, during which the ground bailie had filled and drained a fourth cup, to which a fifth would have succeeded had not Nurse Maud, as a hint that he had imbibed enough already, angrily driven home the spiggot: "This day is the first of August; and at noon we heard Father John of Tranerit say mass for St. Peter's benediction, that the shorn lambs might escape the danger of cold."
"Mass according to the ancient wont."
"Mass according to the Church and faith of our fathers," continued the lady, with some asperity; and then she added plaintively, "I was in hopes that my son—my absent lamb—would be with us ere sunset, and yet he comes not."
"A braw lamb," said Westmains merrily; "a tall and proper youth, six feet high, in full steel harness, with sword, dagger, and spurs."
"A lamb he is to me, Roger; though I trust he may yet prove worse than a wolf to that old fox, Hamilton of Preston. Oh, why doth he tarry?" continued the mother, beginning to soften; "can danger have beset him?"
"Consult Mass John anent this," whispered the nurse; "his prayers are as spells of power——"