"What! the siller?--Ay, ay--trust him for that--they that hide ken best
where to find. He wants to wile him out o' his last guinea, and then
escape to his ain country, the land-louper. I wad likeit weel just to hae
come in at the clipping-time, and gien him a lounder wi' my pike-staff;
he wad hae taen it for a bennison frae some o' the auld dead abbots. But
it's best no to be rash; sticking disna gang by strength, but by the
guiding o' the gally. I'se be upsides wi' him ae day."

"What if you should inform Mr. Oldbuck?" said Lovel.

"Ou, I dinna ken--Monkbarns and Sir Arthur are like, and yet they're no
like neither. Monkbarns has whiles influence wi' him, and whiles Sir
Arthur cares as little about him as about the like o' me. Monkbarns is no
that ower wise himsell, in some things;--he wad believe a bodle to be an
auld Roman coin, as he ca's it, or a ditch to be a camp, upon ony leasing
that idle folk made about it. I hae garr'd him trow mony a queer tale
mysell, gude forgie me. But wi' a' that, he has unco little sympathy wi'
ither folks; and he's snell and dure eneugh in casting up their nonsense
to them, as if he had nane o' his ain. He'll listen the hale day, an yell
tell him about tales o' Wallace, and Blind Harry, and Davie Lindsay; but
ye maunna speak to him about ghaists or fairies, or spirits walking the
earth, or the like o' that;--he had amaist flung auld Caxon out o' the
window (and he might just as weel hae flung awa his best wig after him),
for threeping he had seen a ghaist at the humlock-knowe. Now, if he was
taking it up in this way, he wad set up the tother's birse, and maybe do
mair ill nor gude--he's done that twice or thrice about thae mine-warks;
ye wad thought Sir Arthur had a pleasure in gaun on wi' them the deeper,
the mair he was warned against it by Monkbarns."

"What say you then," said Lovel, "to letting Miss Wardour know the
circumstance?"

"Ou, puir thing, how could she stop her father doing his pleasure?--and,
besides, what wad it help? There's a sough in the country about that six
hundred pounds, and there's a writer chield in Edinburgh has been driving
the spur-rowels o' the law up to the head into Sir Arthur's sides to gar
him pay it, and if he canna, he maun gang to jail or flee the country.
He's like a desperate man, and just catches at this chance as a' he has
left, to escape utter perdition; so what signifies plaguing the puir
lassie about what canna be helped? And besides, to say the truth, I wadna
like to tell the secret o' this place. It's unco convenient, ye see
yoursell, to hae a hiding-hole o' ane's ain; and though I be out o' the
line o' needing ane e'en now, and trust in the power o' grace that I'll
neer do onything to need ane again, yet naebody kens what temptation ane
may be gien ower to--and, to be brief, I downa bide the thought of
anybody kennin about the place;--they say, keep a thing seven year, an'
yell aye find a use for't--and maybe I may need the cove, either for
mysell, or for some ither body."

This argument, in which Edie Ochiltree, notwithstanding his scraps of
morality and of divinity, seemed to take, perhaps from old habit, a
personal interest, could not be handsomely controverted by Lovel, who was
at that moment reaping the benefit of the secret of which the old man
appeared to be so jealous.

This incident, however, was of great service to Lovel, as diverting his
mind from the unhappy occurrence of the evening, and considerably rousing
the energies which had been stupefied by the first view of his calamity.
He reflected that it by no means necessarily followed that a dangerous
wound must be a fatal one--that he had been hurried from the spot even
before the surgeon had expressed any opinion of Captain M'Intyre's
situation--and that he had duties on earth to perform, even should the
very worst be true, which, if they could not restore his peace of mind or
sense of innocence, would furnish a motive for enduring existence, and at
the same time render it a course of active benevolence.--Such were
Lovel's feelings, when the hour arrived when, according to Edie's
calculation--who, by some train or process of his own in observing the
heavenly bodies, stood independent of the assistance of a watch or
time-keeper--it was fitting they should leave their hiding-place, and
betake themselves to the seashore, in order to meet Lieutenant Taffril's
boat according to appointment.

They retreated by the same passage which had admitted them to the prior's
secret seat of observation, and when they issued from the grotto into the
wood, the birds which began to chirp, and even to sing, announced that
the dawn was advanced. This was confirmed by the light and amber clouds
that appeared over the sea, as soon as their exit from the copse
permitted them to view the horizon.--Morning, said to be friendly to the
muses, has probably obtained this character from its effect upon the
fancy and feelings of mankind. Even to those who, like Lovel, have spent
a sleepless and anxious night, the breeze of the dawn brings strength and
quickening both of mind and body. It was, therefore, with renewed health
and vigour that Lovel, guided by the trusty mendicant, brushed away the
dew as he traversed the downs which divided the Den of St. Ruth, as the
woods surrounding the ruins were popularly called, from the sea-shore.

The first level beam of the sun, as his brilliant disk began to emerge
from the ocean, shot full upon the little gun-brig which was lying-to in
the offing--close to the shore the boat was already waiting, Taffril
himself, with his naval cloak wrapped about him, seated in the stern. He
jumped ashore when he saw the mendicant and Lovel approach, and, shaking
the latter heartily by the hand, begged him not to be cast down.
"M'Intyre's wound," he said, "was doubtful, but far from desperate."
His attention had got Lovel's baggage privately sent on board the brig;
"and," he said, "he trusted that, if Lovel chose to stay with the vessel,
the penalty of a short cruise would be the only disagreeable consequence
of his rencontre. As for himself, his time and motions were a good deal
at his own disposal, he said, excepting the necessary obligation of
remaining on his station."

"We will talk of our farther motions," said Lovel, "as we go on board."

Then turning to Edie, he endeavoured to put money into his hand. "I
think," said Edie, as he tendered it back again, "the hale folk here have
either gane daft, or they hae made a vow to rain my trade, as they say
ower muckle water drowns the miller. I hae had mair gowd offered me
within this twa or three weeks than I ever saw in my life afore. Keep the
siller, lad--yell hae need o't, I'se warrant ye, and I hae nane my claes
is nae great things, and I get a blue gown every year, and as mony siller
groats as the king, God bless him, is years auld--you and I serve the
same master, ye ken, Captain Taffril; there's rigging provided for--and
my meat and drink I get for the asking in my rounds, or, at an orra time,
I can gang a day without it, for I make it a rule never to pay for nane;
--so that a' the siller I need is just to buy tobacco and sneeshin, and
maybe a dram at a time in a cauld day, though I am nae dram-drinker to be
a gaberlunzie;--sae take back your gowd, and just gie me a lily-white
shilling."

Upon these whims, which he imagined intimately connected with the honour
of his vagabond profession, Edie was flint and adamant, not to be moved
by rhetoric or entreaty; and therefore Lovel was under the necessity of
again pocketing his intended bounty, and taking a friendly leave of the
mendicant by shaking him by the hand, and assuring him of his cordial
gratitude for the very important services which he had rendered him,
recommending, at the same time, secrecy as to what they had that night
witnessed.--"Ye needna doubt that," said Ochiltree; "I never tell'd tales
out o' yon cove in my life, though mony a queer thing I hae seen in't."

The boat now put off. The old man remained looking after it as it made
rapidly towards the brig under the impulse of six stout rowers, and Lovel
beheld him again wave his blue bonnet as a token of farewell ere he
turned from his fixed posture, and began to move slowly along the sands
as if resuming his customary perambulations.