his collie's familiarity with the minister, and brought him to his
senses by the application of a boot, but Carmichael waived all
apologies. "Rover and I made friends two days ago on the road, and my
clothes will take no injury." And indeed they could not, for
Carmichael, except on Sundays and at funerals, wore a soft hat and suit
of threadbare tweeds, on which a microscopist could have found traces
of a peat bog, moss of dykes, the scale of a trout, and a tiny bit of
heather.

[Illustration: Carmichael had taken his turn.]

His usual fortune befell him that day in Muirtown Station, for two
retrievers, worming their way through the luggage, reached him, and
made known their wants.

"Thirsty? I believe you. All the way from England, and heat enough to
roast you alive. I 've got no dish, else I 'd soon get water.

"Inverness? Poor chaps, that's too far to go with your tongues like a
lime-kiln. Down, good dogs; I 'll be back in a minute."

You can have no idea, unless you have tried it, how much water a soft
clerical hat can hold--if you turn up the edges and bash down the
inside with your fist, and fill the space to the brim. But it is
difficult to convey such a vessel with undiminished content through a
crowd, and altogether impossible to lift one's eyes. Carmichael was
therefore quite unconscious that two new-comers to the shelter were
watching him with keen delight as he came in bareheaded, flushed,
triumphant--amid howls of welcome--and knelt down to hold the cup
till--drinking time about in strict honour--the retrievers had reached
the maker's name.

"Do you think they would like a biscuit?" said a clear, sweet, low
voice, with an accent of pride and just a flavour of amusement in its
tone. Carmichael rose in much embarrassment, and was quite confounded.

They were standing together--father and daughter, evidently--and there
was no manner of doubt about him. A spare man, without an ounce of
superfluous flesh, straight as a rod, and having an air of command,
with keen grey eyes, close-cropped hair turning white, a clean-shaven
face except where a heavy moustache covered a firm-set mouth--one
recognised in him a retired army man of rank, a colonel at least, it
might be a general; and the bronze on his face suggested long Indian
service. But he might have been dressed in Rob Roy tartan, or been a
naval officer in full uniform, for all Carmichael knew. A hundred
thousand faces pass before your eyes a