patiently her turn to fill them anew. Thus by twenty minutes'
skilful loitering she secured from the baxter's daughter the news that
there was a supper at the Sheriff's that very night, and that very large
tarts were at the firing in the baxter's oven.

"Oh, indeed!" cried Miss Mary, when her emissary brought to her those
tidings. "Then it seems the Campbells of Keil are not good enough
company for Sheriff Maclachlan's supper parties! My brother the Cornal,
and my brother the Major-General, would have their own idea about that
if so small a trifle as Madam's tart supper and green tea was worth
their notice or annoyance."

She was visibly disturbed, yet put on a certain air of indifference that
scarcely deceived even Peggy. The worst of it was there was no one
with whom she could share her annoyance, for, if the Paymaster had no
sympathy, the other two brothers were unapproachable. Gilian found her
in a little rain of tears. She started with shame at his discovery, and
set herself to a noisy handling of dinner dishes that by this time he
knew well enough were not in her daily office of industry. And she said
never a word--she that never heard his foot upon the stair without
a smile of pleasure, or saw his face at the door without a mother's
challenge to his appetite.

"What is wrong, aunty?" he said in the Gaelic, using the term it had
been agreed would best suit the new relationship.

"Just nothing at all, my dear," she said without looking round. "What
would be wrong?"

"But you are crying," protested Gilian, alarmed lest he in some way
should have been the cause of her distress.

"Am I?" said Miss Mary. "And if I am, it is just for a silly thing only
a woman would mind, a slight from people not worth heeding." And then
she told, still shamefacedly, her story.

Gilian was amazed.

"I did not think you cared for suppers and teas," he said. "The last
time you went to the Sheriffs you said you would far sooner be at home,
and--"

"Did I?" said she. Then she smiled to find some one who knew it was
not the outing she immediately prized. "Indeed, what you say is true,
Gilian. I'm an old done dame, and it was wiser for the like of me to
be sitting knitting at the fire than going on diverts to their bohea
parties and clashing supper tables. But it's not myself I'm angry for.
Oh, no! they might leave me alone for ever and a day and I would care
not a pin-head, but it's Dugald I'm thinking of--a Major-General--one of