Indeed, you care not even now, so that you are free to wander over the world and taste new pleasures.

That is to be a man, indeed.

Would that I had been born one!" "Nay, Maud," said Sholto, trying to draw the girl again near him, because she kept him at arm's length by the unyielding strength of her wrist, "none shall ever come near my heart save Maud Lindesay alone! I would that I could ride away as sure of you as you are of Sholto MacKim!" "Indeed," cried the girl, with some show of returning spirit, "to that you have no claim.

Never have I said that I loved you, nor indeed that I thought about you at all." "It is true," answered Sholto, "and yet--I think you will remember me when the lamps are blown out.

God speed, belovedst, I hear the trumpet blow, and the horses trampling." For out on the green before the castle the Earl's guard was mustering, and Fergus MacCulloch, the Earl's trumpeter, blew an impatient blast.
It seemed to speak to this effect: _"Hasten ye, hasten ye, come to the riding, Hasten ye, hasten ye, lads of the Dee-- Douglasdale come, come Galloway, Annandale, Galloway blades are the best of the three!"_ Sholto held out his arms at the first burst of the stirring sound, and the girl, all her wayward pride falling from her in a moment, came straight into them.
"Good-by, my sweetheart," he said, stooping to kiss the lips that now said him not nay, but which quivered pitifully as he touched them, "God knows whether these eyes shall rest again on the desire of my heart." Maud looked into his face steadily and searchingly.
"You are sure you will not forget me, Sholto ?" she said; "you will love me as much to-morrow when you are far away, and think me as fair as you do when you hold me thus in your arms upon the battlements of Thrieve ?" Before Sholto had time to answer, the trumpet rang out again, with a call more instant and imperious than before.
[Illustration: "BUT THERE COMETH A NIGHT WHEN EVERY ONE OF US WATCHES THE GREY SHALLOWS TO THE EAST FOR THOSE THAT SHALL RETURN NO MORE!"] Sholto clasped her close to him as the second summons shrilled up into the air.
"God keep my little lass!" he said; "fear not, Maud, I have never loved any but you!" He was gone.