With this he pointed to the window, out of which Cuddie jumped without hesitation; for the intimation he had received plainly implied the personal danger he would otherwise incur.
"Winnocks are no lucky wi' me," was his first reflection when he was in the open air; his next was upon the probable fate of his master. "They'll kill him, the murdering loons, and think they're doing a gude turn! but I'se tak the back road for Hamilton, and see if I canna get some o' our ain folk to bring help in time of needcessity."
So saying, Cuddie hastened to the stable, and taking the best horse he could find instead of his own tired animal, he galloped off in the direction he proposed.
The noise of his horse's tread alarmed for an instant the devotion of the fanatics. As it died in the distance, Macbriar brought his exercise to a conclusion, and his audience raised themselves from the stooping posture, and louring downward look, with which they had listened to it, and all fixed their eyes sternly on Henry Morton.
"You bend strange countenances on me, gentlemen," said he, addressing them. "I am totally ignorant in what manner I can have deserved them."
"Out upon thee! out upon thee!" exclaimed Mucklewrath, starting up: "the word that thou hast spurned shall become a rock to crush and to bruise thee; the spear which thou wouldst have broken shall pierce thy side; we have prayed, and wrestled, and petitioned for an offering to atone the sins of the congregation, and lo! the very head of the offence is delivered into our hand. He hath burst in like a thief through the window; he is a ram caught in the thicket, whose blood shall be a drink-offering to redeem vengeance from the church, and the place shall from henceforth be called Jehovah-Jireh, for the sacrifice is provided. Up then, and bind the victim with cords to the horns of the altar!"
There was a movement among the party; and deeply did Morton regret at that moment the incautious haste with which he had ventured into their company. He was armed only with his sword, for he had left his pistols at the bow of his saddle; and, as the whigs were all provided with fire-arms, there was little or no chance of escaping from them by resistance. The interposition, however, of Macbriar protected him for the moment.
"Tarry yet a while, brethren—let us not use the sword rashly, lest the load of innocent blood lie heavy on us.—Come," he said, addressing himself to Morton, "we will reckon with thee ere we avenge the cause thou hast betrayed.—Hast thou not," he continued, "made thy face as hard as flint against the truth in all the assemblies of the host?"
"He has—he has," murmured the deep voices of the assistants.
"He hath ever urged peace with the malignants," said one.