"Evening? ye feared gowk!" retorted Beatrix. "'Tis the dead hour of midnight, as ye may know by putting your neb oure the kirkyard dyke, where mair may be seen than ye reckon on. Behold the light that dances in yonder hollow."
Juden looked down the long avenue, which the dense foliage caused to resemble a leafy tunnel, and saw far off a lambent and uncertain light playing in the distance.
"'Tis a corpse candle!" screamed Beatrix. "It glints above the grave of an unchristened wean. Hah, fool! frightened as ye are for it, the day is not far off when the same deidlicht will be dancing among the grass that covers your own."
Perspiration burst over Juden's brow, while the woman enjoying the terror she created, uttered a wild laugh.
"My Lord—Jock—I tak ye to witness she foretells my wierd—a clear case o' malice and sorcery as ever came before the Fifteen. But I defy ye, Lucky Gilruth, for the barrels are tarred that shall send thee to the fires o' eternity, ye shameless limmer." Juden trembled between pious confidence and deadly fear—like one who in a dream defies a fiend.
"Hark to St. Cuthbert's bell?" continued Beatrix, who appeared to find a satisfaction in the fear and aversion she created. "Now shall ye behold the spirits of the dead, that many a time and oft on this returning night, I have seen rush forth from yonder woods,—Sir Patrick of Blackadder, and his slayers, Douglas, Hume, and Clermistonlee. Like the driven cloud, they fly without a sound along the gloomy avenue—pursuers and pursued, their swords flashing and their hell-forged harness glinting, as they sweep like shadows oure the dewy grass, with the stars shining through the ribs of their skeleton horses, till the spirit of Blackadder plunges into the loch, as it did on his dying day—then red flash their petronels, and the pure water sparkles around them like diamonds in the moonlight—an eldritch yell arises from its shining bosom, and all is over!"
"What mummery is this, thou eternal babbler?" said Clermistonlee, in a voice of suppressed passion. "Woman, Beatrix, silence, lest I strangle thee!"
The sedan was now within the vaulted ambulatory of the mansion; and the door was securely bolted by Juden, while his master, who had begun to feel no little surprise and anxiety at the silence maintained by Lilian, advanced hurriedly to the chair; but first whispered to his old paramour:
"A word, Beatrix,—is the wainscoted room in the turret prepared for the reception of this little one?" Beatrix nodded. "Peril of thy head, woman, if it were not," he added scornfully, and raised the top of the sedan, while his assistants respectfully withdrew. "Fair Lilian," said he, commencing one of his made-up fine speeches, but not without apparent confusion, "fair Lilian, and not less beloved than fair, pardon this duplicity, for which the excess of my love can be my only, my best excuse. My love—alas! my dear girl, you have known it long, and too long have you slighted it. But on bended knee, behold!—I beseech you to pardon me—Lilian—dearest Lilian——"
"Ha, ha! ho, ho!" laughed a deep and sonorous voice within the sedan. "Horns of Mahoud! if this is not exquisite!" and, instead of beholding Lilian's fair face, shaded by silken ringlets—lo! the exasperated lover was confronted by the bushy perriwig, swart visage, and black moustachios of Dick Douglas of Finland. "Ho, ho! your Lordship has been prodigiously outwitted;" and the cavalier laughed as if he would die.