"I think," said the leader of the ruffians, "that we will have to be down upon the fellow one of these nights, and let him have it well!"
After a while the carousing bandits called for what they called "Black Peter." It was time (they said) "to flick it open."
To Brown's surprise and indignation, Black Peter proved to be nothing else than his own portmanteau, which gave him reasons for some very dark thoughts as to the fate of his postboy. He watched the rascals force his bag open and coolly divide all that was in it among them. Yet he dared not utter a word, well aware that had he done so, the next moment a knife would have been at his throat.
At last, to his great relief, Brown saw them make their preparations for departure. He was left alone with the dead man and the old woman.
Meg Merrilies waited till the first sun of the winter's morn had come, lest one of the revellers of the night should take it into his head to turn back. Then she led Brown by a difficult and precipitous path, till she could point out to him, on the other side of some dense plantations, the road to Kippletringan.
"And here," said she, mysteriously putting a large leathern purse into his hand, "is what will in some degree repay the many alms your house has given me and mine!"
She was gone before he could reply, and when Brown opened the purse, he was astonished to find in it gold to the amount of nearly one hundred pounds, besides many valuable jewels. The gipsy had endowed him with a fortune.
INTERLUDE OF LOCALITY
"And all this happened here?" repeated Sweetheart, incredulously, pointing up at the dark purple mountains of Screel and Ben Gairn.
"Well," I answered, "Scott's Solway is the Dumfries Solway, not the Galloway Solway. Portanferry exists not far from Glencaple on the eastern bank of Nith, and the castle of Ellangowan is as like as possible to Caerlaverock."
