ahead, and I daur ye to move a hair o' your heid till I give the word."

Presently, when they were at the edge of the water, Dougal announced
his intention of crossing. Three boulders in the stream made a
bridge for an active man, and Heritage hopped lightly over. Not so
Dickson, who stuck fast on the second stone, and would certainly
have fallen in had not Dougal plunged into the current and steadied
him with a grimy hand. The leap was at last successfully taken, and
the three scrambled up a rough scaur, all reddened with iron
springs, till they struck a slender track running down the Dean on
its northern side. Here the undergrowth was very thick, and they
had gone the better part of half a mile before the covert thinned
sufficiently to show them the stream beneath. Then Dougal halted
them with a finger on his lips, and crept forward alone.

He returned in three minutes. "Coast's clear," he whispered. "The
tinklers are eatin' their breakfast. They're late at their meat
though they're up early seekin' it."

Progress was now very slow and secret, and mainly on all fours.
At one point Dougal nodded downward, and the other two saw on a
patch of turf, where the Garple began to widen into its estuary, a
group of figures round a small fire. There were four of them, all
men, and Dickson thought he had never seen such ruffianly-looking
customers. After that they moved high up the slope, in a shallow
glade of a tributary burn, till they came out of the trees and found
themselves looking seaward.

On one side was the House, a hundred yards or so back from the edge,
the roof showing above the precipitous scarp. Half-way down the