"Then, here is more perplexity and mystery," said I. "How, in all the world, came you to appear to me in the dress and character of a servant girl—you, who are a lady both by birth and education?" (this I knew from M'Intyre) "and how, above all, did you effect the escape of our unfortunate friend?"
The lady again smiled with a melancholy air. "I will inform you of all," she said, "in a very few words. At the time of Angus' misfortune, I lived, as you may probably know, with my father at ——, in Skye here. On hearing of what had taken place, and of Angus' apprehension, I hastened to Glasgow on pretence of visiting a friend, and got into the house of the jailer in the character of a domestic servant. I will not say by whose means I effected this, as it might still bring ruin on their heads." And here my fair informant gave me the details which are already before the reader. "On effecting his escape," she went on, "I immediately resumed my own dress, and returned to my father's house, where it was next to impossible to detect, in his daughter, the servant girl of the Glasgow jailer. Our remote situation, besides, further secured me from the chance of discovery; and I have not yet been discovered, nor do I suppose I ever will now."
"And why," said I, laughingly, "did you not share the fortunes of the man in whom you thus took so deep an interest?"
"No, no," said the heroic girl, with an expression of deep feeling; "I loved M'Intyre, I confess it, with the most sincere and devoted affection—what I did for him proves it; but I could not think of uniting myself to a man whose hand was red with the blood of a fellow-creature; for it cannot be denied that our unfortunate friend, notwithstanding all his good qualities, was—there is no disguising it—a——" Here her emotions prevented her finishing the sentence—nor did she afterwards finish it; but I had no doubt the word she would have supplied was "murderer."
"Now, sir, you know all," she continued, on recovering from her perturbation; "but you will make no allusion, I beg of you, to anything I have told you, to my friends here, amongst whom are my father, mother, and a sister, who know nothing whatever of the part I acted in effecting M'Intyre's escape."
With this request I promised compliance. We reached the falls of Lubdearg. I parted with Eliza Stewart; and we never met again, as, in a few days afterwards, I left the island; and with this event terminated all connecting circumstances on my part with "The Skean Dhu."
THE SEVEN YEARS' DEARTH.
It was a good many years before the accession of King William III. to the throne of Britain, that a farmer of the name of William Kerr rented a farm in the parish of Minniegaff, in the county of Wigton, on the great road to Port-Patrick. The farm lay at some distance from the road, at the foot of the hills—a wild and secluded spot, possessing few beauties, save to a person who had been reared in the neighbourhood, whose earliest associations were blended with the scenes of his youth.
This farm of Kerr's was of far greater extent than importance, only a few acres of it being in cultivation; but his flock of sheep was pretty extensive, and his black cattle numerous. He was looked upon as a wealthy man at the period of which we speak, had been married for many years, but had no children to enjoy that wealth which increased from year to year. This was the only drawback to his earthly happiness; but he never repined, or let a word escape his lips, to betray the wish of his heart. Even the rude taunts of his more fortunate neighbours he bore with unruffled countenance, though he felt them keenly; and he still loved Grizzel his wife with all the fervour of his first affection—an affection that was returned with usury.