In a moment I was ablaze with passion. I flung myself on the fellow, and with one buffet sent him rolling below the table. Then I was ashamed for myself, for a drunken man is no more fit for an honest blow than a babe or a woman.
But there was no time for shame or aught save action. Three men--the only three who were able to understand the turn of affairs--rose to their feet in a trice, and with drawn swords came towards me. The others sat stupidly staring, save two who had fallen asleep and rolled from their seats.
I picked up my chair, which was broad and heavy and of excellent stout oak, and held it before me like a shield. I received the first man's awkward lunge full on it, and, thrusting it forward, struck him fair above the elbow, while his blade fell with a clatter on the floor. Meantime the others were attacking me to the best of their power, and though they were singly feeble, yet in their very folly they were more dangerous than a mettlesome opponent, who will keep always in front and observe well the rules of the game. Indeed, it might have gone hard with me had not the door been flung violently open and the landlord entered, wringing his hands and beseeching, and close at his heels another man, very tall and thin and dark. At the sight of this second my heart gave a great bound and I cried aloud in delight. For it was my servant Nicol.
In less time than it takes to write it we had disarmed the drunken ruffians and reduced them to order. And, indeed, the task was not a hard one, for they were a vast deal more eager to sleep than to fight, and soon sank to their fitting places on the floor. Forbye they may have had some gleam of sense, and seen how perilous was their conduct in the present regiment of affairs. Then Nicol, who was an old acquaintance of the host's, led me to another room in the back of the house, where we were left in peace; and sitting by the fire told one another some fragment of our tales.
And first for his own, for I would speak not a word till he had told me all there was to tell. He had had much ado to get to Caerdon, for the hills were thick with the military, and at that wild season of the year there is little cover. When he found no letter he set off for the hiding-place above Scrape, where he knew I had been, and found it deserted. Thence he had shaped his way again to Smitwood with infinite labour and told Marjory the fruit of his errand. At this her grief had been so excessive that nothing would content her but that he must be off again and learn by hook or crook some word of my whereabouts. So began his wanderings among the hills, often attended with danger and always with hardship, but no trace of me could he find. At last, somewhere about the Moffat Water, he had forgathered with a single tinker whom he had once befriended in the old days when he had yet power to help. From this man he had learned that the Baillies had with them one whom he did not know for certain, but shrewdly guessed as the laird of Barns. With all speed he had set off on this new quest and followed me in my journey right to the moss of Biggar. Here all signs of the band came to an end, for most of the folk of the place knew naught of the airt of the gipsy flight, and such as knew were loth to tell, being little in a mood to incur the Baillies' wrath. So naught was left for him but to return to the place whence he had started. Here he was met with the bitter news that I have already set down. He was thrown into a state of utter despondency, and sat for long in a fine confusion of mind. Then he fell to reasoning. There was no place whither Gilbert could take a woman save his own house of Eaglesham, for Dawyck and Barns were too near the hills and myself. You must remember that at this time my servant had no inkling of the momentous event which had set our positions upside down. Now, if they took her to the west they would do so with all speed; they had but one day's start; he might yet overtake them, and try if his wits could find no way out of the difficulty.