Fiction > Book editions > London, 1886 - Kidnapped

162                                   KIDNAPPED.
"Why, very well said," replies the Factor. " But
if I may make so bold as ask, what does this honest
man so far from his country? and why does he come
seeking the brother of Ardshiel? I have power here,
I must tell you. I am King's Factor upon several of
these estates, and have twelve files of soldiers at my
back."
"I have heard a waif word in the country," said
I, a little nettled, "that you were a hard man to
drive."
He still kept looking at me, as if in doubt.
"Well," said he, at last, "your tongue is bold ; but
I am no unfriend to plainness. If ye had asked me the
way to the door of James Stewart on any other day but
this, I would have set ye right and bidden ye God speed.
But to-day-eh, Mungo?" And he turned again to
look at the lawyer.
But just as he turned there came the shot of a fire-
lock from higher up the hill; and with the very sound
of it Glenure fell upon the road.
"Oh, I am dead!" he cried, several times over.
The lawyer had caught him up and held him in his
arms, the servant standing over and clasping his hands.
And now the wounded man looked from one to another
with scared eyes, and there was a change in his voice
that went to the heart.
"Take care of yourselves," says he. "I am
dead."
He tried to open his clothes as if to look for the