And Lord Traquair did not plead in vain. It was a little thing to do,
Will thought, for one who had saved him from the gallows tree.

"'O mony a time, my lord,' he said,
'I've stown the horse frae the sleeping loon;
But for you I'll steal a beast as braid,
For I'll steal Lord Durie frae Edinboro toon.'"

* * * * *

A light northerly breeze piped shrill through the long bent grass beyond
Leith Links, sweeping thin and nippingly across shining sands left bare
by a receding tide; down by the rippling water-line, as the sun of a
late spring day neared his setting, clamouring gulls bickered noisily
over the possession of some fishy dainty. Out from near-lying patches of
whin, and from the low, wind-blown sand-hills, rabbits stole warily,
nibbling the short herbage now and then, but ever with an air of
suspicion and manifest unease, for behind a big clump of whin, during
half the day there had lain hid a thick-set, powerfully built man.

"De'il tak' the body!" he grumbled, sitting up and stretching himself as
he glanced along the beach; "he's lang o' comin'."

As he gazed, the sight of a distant horseman riding westward brought him
sharply to his feet, and snatching up a long cloak that lay by his side,
he walked leisurely through the yielding sand till he reached the firm
beach within tide mark, along which the horseman was now quietly
cantering.

"Ye'll be Lord Durie, I'm thinkin'," he cried, raising his hand to stay