pportunity of evading the eyes of his grandmother. On her dimness
of sight, however, he depended too confidently after all; for either she
was not so blind as he thought she was, or she made up for the defect of
her vision by the keenness of her observation. She saw enough to cause
her considerable annoyance, though it suggested nothing inconsistent
with rectitude on the part of the boy, further than that there was
something underhand going on. One supposition after another arose in
the old lady's brain, and one after another was dismissed as improbable.
First, she tried to persuade herself that he wanted to take the
provisions to school with him, and eat them there--a proceeding of which
she certainly did not approve, but for the reproof of which she was
unwilling to betray the loopholes of her eyes. Next she concluded, for
half a day, that he must have a pair of rabbits hidden away in some nook
or other--possibly in the little strip of garden belonging to the house.
And so conjecture followed conjecture for a whole week, during which,
strange to say, not even Betty knew that Shargar slept in the house. For
so careful and watchful were the two boys, that although she could not
help suspecting something from the expression and behaviour of Robert,
what that something might be she could not imagine; nor had she and her
mistress as yet exchanged confidences on the subject. Her observation
coincided with that of her mistress as to the disappearance of odds and
ends of eatables--potatoes, cold porridge, bits of oat-cake; and even,
on one occasion, when Shargar happened to be especially ravenous, a
yellow, or cured and half-dried, haddock, which the lad devoured raw,
vanished from her domain. He went to school in the morning smelling so
strong in consequence, that they told him he must have been passing the
night in Scroggie's cart, and not on his horse's back this time.

The boys kept their secret well.

One evening, towards the end of the week, Robert, after seeing Shargar
disposed of for the night, proceeded to carry out a project which
had grown in his brain within the last two days in consequence of an
occurrence with which his relation to Shargar had had something to do.
It was this:

The housing of Shargar in the garret had led Robert to make a close
acquaintance with the place. He was familiar with all the outs and
ins of the little room which he considered his own, for that was a
civilized, being a plastered, ceil