Temptation assailed me. If I denied the Covenant, I could with a firmer claim demand to be set free--and then I might yet carry my message through. "No" was upon my lips--but it died unspoken there. I heard the notes of a flute on a heather-clad hill-side: saw again a heap of smouldering ashes where a home of love had been. I could not deny the Covenant.
Firmly I answered "I am"--and in the gathering shadows I saw the radiant face of Mary smiling upon me--as she blew me a kiss with either hand.
"Umphm," said Sandy, "I thocht as muckle."
"So ye're a Covenanter, are ye?" roared the giant. "I'll learn ye! Wull ye say 'God save the King?'"
"God save the King," I answered promptly. "I am a loyal subject and a Covenanter."
"Ye lie," he shouted. "The Covenanters are a' rebels. Wull ye tak' the Test?"
In the cave at the Linn I had heard Hector repeat the involved sentences of the Test with scorn upon his lips, and I knew that this half-drunken trooper could not possibly find his way through them; so I answered:
"If you can put the Test to me you shall have my answer."
Sandy--with the bottle in his hand--looked over his shoulder and laughed softly. The giant turned upon him. "Whit the deevil are ye lauchin' at"--and then turning to me, "I'm nae scholar--and I canna min' the words, but if I canna pit the Test to you I can pit you tae the test--and by heaven I will." A look of fiendish cruelty swept over his hard face.
"Try him wi' the match," said Sandy.