to the
party, but whom he did not know, and who held a little aloof from the
rest--keeping his visor down while eating and drinking, in a somewhat
suspicious manner, as though to avoid observation.

Just as David had resolved to point this person out to his father, Sir
Patrick was summoned to speak to the Lady Prioress. Therefore the youth
thought it incumbent upon him to deal with the matter, and advancing
towards the stranger, said, 'Good fellow, thou art none of our
following. How, now!' for a pair of gray eyes looked up with recognition
in them, and a low voice whispered, 'Davie Drummond, keep my secret till
we be across the Border.'

'Geordie, what means this?'

'I canna let her gang! I ken that she scorns me.'

'That proud peat Jean?'

'Whist! whist! She scorns me, and the King scarce lent a lug to my
father's gude offer, so that he can scarce keep the peace with their
pride and upsettingness. But I love her, Davie, the mere sight of her is
sunshine, and wha kens but in the stour of this journey I may have the
chance of standing by her and defending her, and showing what a leal
Scot's heart can do? Or if not, if I may not win her, I shall still be
in sight of her blessed blue een!'

David whistled his perplexity. 'The Yerl,' said he, 'doth he ken?'

'I trow not! He thinks me at Tantallon, watching for the raid the
Mackays are threatening--little guessing the bird would be flown.'

'How cam' ye to guess that same, which was, so far as I know, only
decided two days syne?'

'Our pursuivant was to bear a letter to the King, and I garred him let
me bear him company as one of his grooms, so that I might delight mine
eyes with the sight of her.'

David laughed. His time was not come, and this love and admiration for
his young cousin was absurd in his eyes. 'For a young bit lassie,' he
said; 'gin it had been a knight! But what will your father say to mine?'

'I will write to him when I am well over the Border,' said Geordie, 'and
gin he kens that your father had no hand in it he will deem no ill-will.
Nor could he harm you if he did.'

David did not feel entirely satisfied, on one side of his mind as to his
own loyalty to his father, or Geordie's to 'the Yerl,' and yet there was
something diverting to the enterprising mind in the stolen expedition;
and the fellow-feeling which results in honour to contemporaries made
him promise not to betray the young man and to shield him from notice as
best he might. Wit