"Thanks, thanks," again said the Frenchman, pressing the hand of the Major, who, apparently delighted at the prospect of witnessing such an encounter between the two most renowned swordsmen in Europe, drank off his stoup of wine, muffled himself in his rocquelaure, and with his little cocked hat stuck jauntily on one side of the Ramilies wig, left the apartment, and demanded his horse and the reckoning.
"Then your honour will be fulehardy, and tempt Providence," said the landlord.
"Nay, gudeman, but you cannot tempt me to stay just now. I ride only through the town to Balcomie, and will return anon. The Hopetoun family are there, I believe?"
"Yes; but saving my lady at the preachings, we see little o' them; for Sir William has bidden at Edinburgh, or elsewhere, since his English gold coft the auld tower from the Balcomies of that Ilk, the year before the weary Union, devil mend it!"
"Amen, say I; and what callest thou English gold?"
"The doolfu' compensation, o' whilk men say he had his share."
"Man, thou liest, and they who say so lie! for to the last moment his voice was raised against that traitorous measure of Queensbury and Stair, and now every energy of his soul is bent to its undoing!" replied the Major, fiercely, as he put spurs to his horse, and rode rapidly down the dark and then grassy street, at the end of which the clank of his horse's hoofs died away, as he diverged upon the open ground that lay northward of the town, and by which he had to approach the tower of Balcomie.
The Frenchman remained long buried in thought, and as he sipped his wine, gazed dreamily on the changing embers that glowed on the hearth, and cast a warm light on the blue delft lining of the fireplace. The reminiscences of the war in Flanders had called up many a sad and many a bitter recollection.
"I would rather," thought he, "that the man I am to encounter to-morrow was not a Scot, for the kindness of to-night, and of that terrible night in the snow-clad plain of Arras, inspire me with a warm love for all the people of this land. But my promise must be redeemed, my adventure achieved, or thou, my dear, my rash Athalie, art lost to me!" and he paused to gaze with earnestness upon a jewel that glittered on his hand. It was a hair ring, bound with gold, and a little shield bearing initials, clasped the small brown tress that was so ingeniously woven round it.
As he gazed on the trinket, his full dark eyes brightened for a moment, as the mild memories of love and fondness rose in his heart, and a bright smile played upon his haughty lip and lofty brow. Other thoughts arose, and the eyebrows that almost met over the straight Grecian nose of Lemercier, were knit as he recalled the ominous words of his recent acquaintance—