Surprised at finding Margaret bolted in this parlour, Sir John learnt that “she had been frightened, she knew not why, at the solitude of her own room, and had bolted herself in the parlour.”  Although she was soon laughed out of her childish fears, Lady Swinton was quick enough to perceive that Margaret had not communicated everything, and insisted upon knowing the whole truth.  The child made no objection, as she had not been told to keep the secret from her mother.  After describing all that happened, Lady Swinton kissed her daughter tenderly and said, “Since you have kept the secret so well, you shall know something more of this strange lady.”

Thereupon Lady Swinton pushed aside one of the oaken panels in the parlour, which revealed a small room beyond, where sat the mysterious lady.  “And now, Margaret dear,” said her mother, “listen to me.  This lady is persecuted by cruel men, who, if they find her, will certainly take her life.  She is my guest, she is now yours, and I am sure I need not tell you the meanest peasant in all Scotland would shame to betray his guest.”

Margaret promised to keep the secret, never evincing the slightest curiosity to know who the lady was, and it is said she had reached her twentieth year when one day the adventure of her childhood was explained.  It seems that the lady in question was a Mrs. Macfarlane, daughter of Colonel Charles Straiton, a zealous Jacobite.  When about nineteen years old she married John Macfarlane—­law agent of Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat—­who was many years her senior.  Soon after her marriage Mrs. Macfarlane made the acquaintance of Captain John Cayley, a commissioner of Customs, and on September 29th, 1716, he called on her at Edinburgh, when, for reasons only known to herself or him, she fired two shots at him with a pistol, one of which pierced his heart.

According to Sir Bernard Burke, it was when she would not yield to Captain Cayley’s immoral overtures that the latter vowed to blacken her character, a threat which he so successfully carried out “that not one of her female acquaintances upon whom she called would admit her; not one of all she met in the street would acknowledge her.”  Desperate at this villainy on his part, Mrs. Macfarlane, under pretence of agreeing to Captain Cayley’s overtures, sent for him, when fully confident that he was about to reap the fruit of his infamous daring he obeyed her summons.  But no sooner had he entered the room than she locked the door, and, snatching up a brace of pistols, she exclaimed:  “Wretch, you have blasted the reputation of a woman who never did you the slightest wrong.  You have fixed an indelible stain upon the child at her bosom; and all this because, coward as you are, you thought there was no one to take her part.”  At the same time, it is said, she fired two shots at him with a pistol, one of which pierced his heart.  Her husband asserted, however, that she fired to save herself from outrage, an explanation which she affirmed was