A cry of indignation and rage broke from Wallace and those standing round him, and the Scottish leader again repeated his oath to take a bloody vengeance for the deed.

“And who are among the murdered?” he asked, after a pause.

“Alas!  Sir William,” Grahame said, “your good uncle, Sir Ronald Crawford, the Sheriff of Ayr, is one; and also Sir Richard Wallace of Riccartoun; Sir Bryce Blair, and Sir Neil Montgomery, Boyd, Barclay, Steuart, Kennedy, and many others.”

Wallace was overwhelmed with grief at the news that both his uncles, to whom he was greatly attached, had perished.  Most of those around had also lost relatives and friends, and none could contain their grief and indignation.

“Was my uncle, Sir Robert Gordon, among the victims?” Archie inquired.

“No,” Sir John replied; “happily he was one of the last who came along the road.”

“Thank God for that!” Archie said earnestly; “my uncle’s slowness has saved his life.  He was ever late for business or pleasure, and my aunt was always rating him for his unpunctuality.  She will not do so again, for assuredly it has saved his life.”

The men came in but slowly, for the bands had all dispersed to their homes, and it was only those who lived within a few miles who could arrive in time.  Little over fifty men had come in by the hour named.  With these Wallace started at once towards Ayr.  Archie’s band fell in with their arms, for they too burned to revenge the massacre, and Wallace did not refuse Archie’s request that they might join.

“Let them come,” he said; “we shall want every sword and pike tonight.”

This was the first time that Wallace had seen the band under arms, for at the battle of Biggar, Archie had kept them from his sight, fearing that he might order them from the field.

“They look well, Sir Archie, and in good military order.  Hitherto I have regarded them but as messengers, and as such they have done good service indeed; but I see now that you have them in good order, and that they can do other service on a pinch.”

One member of Wallace’s band was left behind, with orders to wait until seven o’clock, and then to bring on as fast as they could march all who might arrive before that hour.  The band marched to within a mile of the barns.  They then halted at a stack of straw, and sat down while one of Archie’s band went forward to see what was being done.  He reported that a great feast, at which the governor and all the officers of the garrison, with other English dwelling in town, were present, was just beginning in the great barn where the massacre had taken place.

Soon after nine o’clock the man who had been left behind, with ten others, who had come in after Wallace had marched, came up.  Each man, by Wallace’s directions, drew a great truss of straw from the stack, and then the party, now eighty in all, marched toward the barn.  Wallace’s instructions were that so soon as the work had fairly begun, Grahame, with Archie and half the band, was to hurry off to seize the gate of Ayr, feigning to be a portion of the guard at the barn.