en Bourhope and Corrie.

III.--A MORNING MEETING AND AN EVENING'S READING.

At this juncture it struck Bourhope, riding home from the morning
drill, to ask himself what could possibly take Chrissy Hunter out so
early every morning. He had already seen her once or twice, keeping
out of the way of him and his companions, and returning again from
the opposite end of Priorton, which was flanked by the doctor's house.
Corrie, he noticed, was never with her. Indeed, Bourhope had a strong
suspicion that Corrie retreated to her pillow again after showing him
her lovely face--lovely even in the pink curl-papers. But Chrissy
certainly dressed immediately, and took a morning walk, by which her
complexion at least did not profit. Not being a very strong little
woman, her brown face was apt to look jaded and streaky, when
Bourhope, resting from the fatigues of his drill, lounged with the
girls in the early forenoon in Mrs. Spottiswoode's drawing-room. So it
was worth while, he thought, to spur up to Chrissy, and inquire what
took her abroad at such an untimely hour.

When Bourhope caught a nearer glimpse of Chrissy he was rather dismayed
to see that she had been crying. Bourhope hated to see girls crying,
particularly girls like Chrissy, to whom it was not becoming. He had no
particular fancy for Cinderellas or other beggar-maids. He would have
hated to find that his kinsfolk and friendly host and hostess, for whom
he had a considerable regard, were mean enough and base enough to
maltreat a poor little guest of their own invitation. Notwithstanding
these demurs, Tom Spottiswoode of Bourhope rode so fast up to Chrissy as
to cause her to give a violent start when she turned.

"Hallo! Do you go to market, Miss Chrissy? or what on earth takes you
out in the town before the shutters are down?" pointing with his
sheathed sword to a closed shop.

Chrissy was taken aback, and there was something slightly hysterical in
her laugh, but she answered frankly enough, "I go to Dr. Stark's, Mr.
Spottiswoode. Dr. Stark attends my mother, and is at Blackfaulds every
day. I wait in his laboratory till he comes there before setting out; he
goes his rounds early, you know. He lets me know how mother was
yesterday, and as he is a kind man, he carries our letters,--Maggie and
Arabella and I are great writers, and postage comes to be expensive--a
great deal too expensive for us at Blackfaulds; but the doctor is a kind
man, and he 'favours' our lette