“Little fear o’ that,” said he.  “Mr. Duke will send you home i’ the morning; but it’s as well you should stay here until the evidence is complete.  Bailie Thomson will not agree to your being set at liberty before the inquiry.”

“And when is the inquiry to be?” I asked.

“At ten o’clock tomorrow morning,” said Mr. Drever.  “You see, Halcro, they’re not to put you on your trial in any formal way.  That could only take place at Kirkwall, or before the procurator fiscal.  But the roads are all blocked wi’ snow, and there’s no getting to Kirkwall just now.  Even the St. Magnus smugglers, and another gang that Mr. Fox arrested yestreen up at Sandwick, have to be imprisoned here until the roads are opened up.  But it will be easy to prove your innocence.  Thora will make that perfectly clear, as ye will see.”

“Thora!” I exclaimed.  “Then Thora has been found?”

“Found! certainly.  She never was lost.  However, ye’ll hear all about that matter again.  Just leave it all to me, Halcro, and dinna be downcast about biding here another night.  But I must away now.  Good e’en to ye!”

“Good e’en, sir!”

The good man was leaving me abruptly, when at the door he turned back.

“Oh, Halcro!” said he, as though suddenly remembering something, “they tell me that your viking’s stone has been amissing.  Have ye heard anything of it yet?”

“Why, yes, Mr. Drever,” I replied.  “I found it at the head of the Gaulton Cliff on Saturday.”

“Just so,” said he smiling, “I had heard that.  Now that stone may be wanted in evidence.  Would you mind letting me have it?”

“Here it is, sir,” I said, handing it to him.

And taking it with him, he left me to my thoughts.

The morning of the inquiry came round, and at about ten o’clock Jimmy Macfarlane opened the door of my place of confinement and beckoned me to follow him.  He conducted me through a long passage into a large room adjoining the prison house.

It was a comfortable apartment, with a bright peat fire burning on the hearth, before which Colin Lothian’s dog lay sound asleep.  Close to the fire and athwart the room was a long table, where, as I entered, I saw Bailie Duke seated at his ease in a large armchair.  At his right sat Bailie Thomson—­a man with a forbidding face, whom I had often of late seen in the company of Carver Kinlay.  At Mr. Duke’s left hand was the schoolmaster, prim and businesslike as I had often seen him look in the school when anything of importance was pending, such as a class examination.  Near him sat Lieutenant Fox, looking very handsome in his naval uniform, and very much at his ease.  The only other person in the room was Dr. Linklater, who smiled a greeting to me as I stood at the door.

“Take a seat there, Ericson, my lad,” said Mr. Duke, indicating a chair opposite to him in the middle of the floor.

And then he turned to the dominie, speaking with him in an undertone.