he "had the Gaelic,"
and the sing-song voice and mysterious words sounded weirdly in her
ears. Sometimes, as he put the final polish on the boots, he would
break into song,--a strange, tuneless song which quavered up and down,
and ended on long-sustained notes. Once even she saw the slippered feet
move in jaunty dance-step to and fro, but at the sound of a clatter of
saucepans from the kitchen close at hand he retired into his corner, and
polished with redoubled energy. Mrs McNab evidently kept her husband
in order, even as she did her house!

Elspeth, the maid, was a girl of eighteen or twenty, with a thin figure
encased in a lavender print gown, and flaxen hair pulled so tightly back
from her forehead that her eyebrows seemed to be permanently elevated by
the process. Her face shone from the effects of constant soaping, and
was absolutely void of expression. From morn till night she rushed
breathlessly from one duty to another, rated continuously by Mrs
McNab's strident voice, with never so much as a bleat of protest. When
waiting at table, she snored loudly from nervousness, and the big red
fist trembled as she carried the dishes to and fro, but her face
remained blankly expressionless as before. Margot smiled at her
radiantly every time that they met, and mentally decided to bequeath to
her half her own wardrobe before leaving the Glen. In comparison with
such a lot of drudgery, her own life seemed inexcusably idle and self-
indulgent!

It took a considerable amount of courage to beard in her own den a woman
of whom the members of her own household stood in such evident awe, but
there was at least no nervousness apparent in Margot's manner as she
tapped at the kitchen door at eleven o'clock that first morning, and
thrust her pretty face round the opening to request permission to enter.
Mrs McNab had descended from her work upstairs, and surely her heart
must be softened by the spectacle of those two immaculately tidy rooms!

"Mrs McNab, I'm cold! May I come in and warm myself by your fire?"

The mistress of the inn turned a stonily surprised face from the table,
before which she stood chopping suet with a short-handled knife; she did
not suspend her work, but simply heightened her voice to make it heard
above the harsh, monotonous noise.

"Cold, are ye? Havers! It's a fine June day. There's no call for any
one to feel cold, if they don't sit about idling away their time. Put
on yer cloak, and go a