he said, as she drew near, "your aunt didna take you
with her into the manse. Are you not weary sitting so long on the
stones?"

"No," said Lilias. "Archie liked better to bide out here. This is a
bonny place."

"Oh, ay, it's a bonny place enow," said Mrs Stirling. Then, turning to
Archie, she said, "And so you liked better to bide out here than to go
in to your dinner at the manse? Well, it's a good bairn that likes to
do what it's bidden. I dare say Mrs Blair would have felt some
delicacy in taking you both into the manse parlour; though why she
should, is more than the like of me knows."

To this there was no reply to be made; and in a minute, turning again to
Lilias, she asked:

"And when are you going to the manse as nurse, my dear?"

Lilias said she was not going at all.

"No! Where then? To Pentlands? I told your aunt that Mrs Jones, the
housekeeper, wanted a lassie to help in the kitchen; but it's a place
full of temptations for a young thing like you. I wonder at Mrs
Blair."

Lilias replied, rather hastily, that she was not going anywhere just
now; she was going to bide at home with her aunt.

"Well, well, my dear, you needn't be angry at my asking; though there's
little wonder that the daughter of Alexander Elder shouldn't like to
have it said that she ought to go and gain her bread as a servant. We
can't always part with our pride when we part with our money. Nobody
knows that better than I do."

"It's not pride that keeps me at home," said Lilias, in a low voice. "I
would go gladly if my aunt thought it needful; but she says it is not."

"Oh, well, my dear, I dare say your aunt knows best. She may have money
that I didn't know of. Maybe you wasn't so ill off as is said."

"Whisht! do you not see that you are vexing the bairns? Never mind her,
my dear," said the pleasant-looking young woman whom Lilias had called
Ellen Wilson, sitting down on the stone beside her. "I think this part
of the country seems to agree with you both. Your brother looks much
better than he did when he came first."

Lilias smiled gratefully in answer to this, and looked with loving pride
at her brother. But Nancy Stirling had not yet said her say.

"Looks better, does he? I wonder how he could have looked before? Such
a whitefaced creature I have seldom seen. He reminds me of the laddie
that died at Pentlands, of a decline, a month since. I doubt he isn't
long for this world."

"Whisht!" again