communication with the
village than usual. Davie had been both master and man for the most
part, and had had little time for anything else. Katie had been now and
then for a visit to Miss Elizabeth, and to other people too, for Katie
confessed to being fond of visiting, and above most things disliked the
idea of being called odd or proud, or whatever else one was liable to be
called in Gershom who "set out to be different from her neighbours."
The younger children were not yet considered to be beyond such teaching
as they had at the Scott school-house, so that there had been little
coming and going to the village, and all the talk that had been indulged
in there as to their affairs had hurt no one at Ythan.

They had their own talks, that is, Davie and Katie had. Their
grandfather was as silent at home as elsewhere as to the ill that his
enemy meditated toward him, so silent that even hopeful grannie grew
first doubtful and then anxious, fearing more than she would have feared
any outburst of bitterness, this silent brooding over evils that might
be drawing near. She dropped a cheerful word now and then as to the
certainty that they would never be left in their old age to anxiety and
trouble; but though he usually assented to her words, it was almost
always silently.

"It is all in God's hands," he said once, and he never got beyond that.

But as for the young ones, there was no end to the talk they had as to
Jacob Holt and his plans, not that they knew much about them, or were in
the least afraid of them. Katie was troubled sometimes, but Davie made
light of her fears, and the rest followed Davie's lead. Davie was of
Mr Green's opinion:

"It will never amount to anything, all that he'll do to my grandfather.
He'll stop before he gets to the end. Mind, I don't say that he won't
be as great a rogue as he knows how to be, but he is a small man, is
Jacob, and he'll make a muddle of it. He couldn't do his worst with the
eyes of all Gershom on him. He hasn't pluck to take even what is his
own against the general opinion."

But Katie thought him hard on Jacob.

"He is not a fool, Davie; and surely he's not a rogue altogether. But
I'm not caring for him; I'm only thinking of grandfather."

And though Katie did not say it, she was thinking that her grandfather's
silence and gloom might do him more harm than even the loss of half of
Ythan. But Davie did not know her thoughts, and he answered the words a
little