eard the creak
of the gate, and presently was startled by seeing two horsemen ride past
him. "They must have muffled their horses' feet," he said to himself.
"They are up to no good. I wish there had only been one of them." Mike
slipped off his shoes and started in pursuit, keeping just far enough
behind the horsemen to enable him to observe the outline of their
figures. For half a mile they proceeded quietly. Then they stopped,
dismounted, removed the cloths from their horses' feet, and remounting
rode forward at a gallop. Mike's old exercise as a runner now rendered
him good service. He could already tell, by the direction which the
horsemen were taking, that they were bearing to the east of Edinburgh,
but he resolved to follow as far as possible in order to see exactly
whither they went. The road, or rather track, lay across a moorland
country. The ground was often deep and quaggy, and the horsemen several
times checked their speed, and went at a slow walk, one advancing on
foot along the track to guide the way. These halts allowed breathing
time for Mike, who found it hard work to keep near them when going at
full speed. At last, after riding for an hour, the horsemen halted at a
solitary house on the moorland, Here several horses, held by troopers,
were standing. Mike crept round to the back of the house, and looked in
at the window. He saw two English officers sitting by a fire, while a
light burned on a table. Mike at once recognized in one of them the
dreaded General Cromwell, whom he had seen at Drogheda.

"What a fool I was," he muttered to himself, "to have come without my
pistol. I would have shot him as he sits, and so wiped out Drogheda."

At the moment the door opened, and a trooper in Scotch uniform entered.
"I have brought this letter," he said, "from Alan Campbell."

The general took the letter and opened it. "Campbell promises," he said
to the other officer, "to open fire upon the detachment in the village
with the guns of the castle as soon as we attack. One of the men who has
brought this will remain here and guide our troops across the morass. He
suggests that two hundred foot and as many horse should be here at eight
to-morrow evening. All he stipulates for is that Colonel Furness, the
Royalist who commands the enemy's detachment, shall be given over to
him, he having, it seems, some enmity with Argyll. Furness? ah, that is
the officer whom I sent to the Bermudas from Drogheda. We had advices of