soft turf and stones--to the river. Of
course he looked out. Yes, there was Miss Honnor--fishing the Whirl
Pool--with old Robert sitting on the shingle watching her. Would she
notice?--or would he get down and walk along to her and claim the
good-bye she had forgotten? The next moment he was reassured. She caught
sight of the approaching wagonette; she carefully placed her rod on the
shingle, and then came walking along the river-bank, towards the ford,
at which the horses had now arrived.

Even at a distance he could not but admire the grace and ease and
dignity of her carriage--the harmonious movement of a perfectly formed
figure; and as she drew nearer he kept asking himself (as if the
question were necessary) whether he would be able to take away a keen
mental photograph of those fine features--the clear and placid
forehead, the strongly marked eyebrows, the calm, self-reliant eyes, the
proud and yet not unsympathetic lines of the mouth. She came nearer; a
smile lit up her face; and there was a kind of radiance there, he
thought. He had leaped down from the wagonette: he went forward to meet
her; her hand was outstretched.

"I am sorry you are going," she said, frankly.

"And I am far more sorry to have to go," said he, and he held her hand a
little longer than there was any occasion for, until she gently withdrew
it. "There are so many things I should like to say to you, Miss Honnor;
but somehow they always escape you just when they're wanted; and I've
told you so often before that I am not likely to forget your kindness to
me up here--"

"Surely it is the other way about!" she said, pleasantly. "You have come
and cheered up my lonely hours--and been so patient--never
grumbled--never looked away up the hill as if you would have given your
life to be after the grouse; and in the drawing-room of an evening
you've always sung when I asked you--when I was inconsiderate enough to
ask you--"

"My goodness! Miss Honnor," he said, "if I had known you looked on it in
that light, I should have sung for you constantly, whether you asked or
not."

"Well, it's all over now," said she, "and I hope you are taking away
with you a pleasant memory of Strathaivron."

"I have spent the happiest days of my life here," he said; and then he
hesitated--was about to speak--hesitated again--and finally blurted out,
"Is there anything I can do for you in London, Miss Honnor?"

"No, thanks," she said. "By the way, you'll have an ho