In a historical sense "Redgauntlet" is a sequel to Waverley.

It takes up the action some eighteen years later, at "that point of time when the Chevalier Charles Edward, though fallen into the sere and yellow leaf, was yet meditating a second attempt, which could scarcely have been more hopeless than his first."

Mr. Alexander Fairford, a worthy advocate of Edinburgh, has received into his home, for his son Alan's sake, an impulsive young man known as Darsie Latimer. Darsie has an ample income and is assured of a legacy upon reaching the age of twenty-five; but meanwhile knows nothing of his family history and is warned not to venture into England.

The two young men have a David and Jonathan affection, although Mr. Fairford eyes Darsie’s harum-scarum tendencies with disapproval. Alan enters the law, while Darsie sets forth on a jaunt to Dumfries, writing back chatty letters to his friend, who replies in kind.

At Solway Firth, Darsie escapes the dangers of tide and quicksand by the intervention of a taciturn stranger, who conducts him grudgingly to an out-of-the-way and mysterious home, where Darsie is sheltered for the night ...