iona!" was all I could get out.

As for her, she said nothing in the world, but only waved her hand and
smiled to me, and was suddenly carried away again from before the
loophole.

That vision was no sooner lost than I ran to the house-door, where I
found I was locked in; thence back to Miss Ramsay, crying for the key,
but might as well have cried upon the Castle rock. She had passed her
word, she said, and I must be a good lad. It was impossible to burst the
door, even if it had been mannerly; it was impossible I should leap from
the window, being seven stories above ground. All I could do was to
crane over the close and watch for their reappearance from the stair. It
was little to see, being no more than the tops of their two heads, each
on a ridiculous bobbin of skirts, like to a pair of pincushions. Nor did
Catriona so much as look up for a farewell; being prevented (as I heard
afterwards) by Miss Grant, who told her folk were never seen to less
advantage than from above downward.

On the way home, as soon as I was free, I upbraided Miss Grant for her
cruelty.

"I am sorry you was disappointed," says she demurely. "For my part I was
very pleased. You looked better than I dreaded; you looked--if it will
not make you vain--a mighty pretty young man when you appeared in the
window. You are to remember that she could not see your feet," says she,
with the manner of one reassuring me.

"O!" cried I, "leave my feet be--they are no bigger than my
neighbours'."

"They are even smaller than some," said she, "but I speak in parables,
like a Hebrew prophet."

"I marvel little they were sometimes stoned!" says I. "But, you
miserable girl, how could you do it? Why should you care to tantalise me
with a moment?"

"Love is like folk," says she; "it needs some kind of vivers."[22]

"O, Barbara, let me see her properly!" I pleaded. "You can--you see her
when you please; let me have half an hour."

"Who is it that is managing this love-affair? You? Or me?" she asked,
and, as I continued to press her with my instances, fell back upon a
deadly expedient: that of imitating the tones of my voice when I called
on Catriona by name; with which, indeed, she held me in subjection for
some days to follow.

There was never the least word heard of the memorial, or none by me.
Prestongrange and his Grace the Lord President may have heard of it (for
what I know) on the deafest sides of their heads; they kept it to
themselves at leas