se than I am, mamma. _I_ was at the bottom of it."

"I never said they were," she answered.

But in her heart she thought if they were not, there was little amiss
with them.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Alec was once more condemned to the sofa, and Annie had to miss him,
and wonder what had become of him. She always felt safe when Alec was
there, and when he was not she grew timid; although whole days would
sometimes pass without either speaking to the other. But before the
morning was over she learned the reason of his absence.

For about noon, when all was tolerably harmonious in the school, the
door opened, and the face of Robert Bruce appeared, with gleaming eyes
of wrath.

"Guid preserve's!" said Scrumpie to his next neighbour. "Sic a hidin'
as we s' a' get! Here's Rob Bruce! Wha's gane and tell't him?"

But some of the gang of conspirators, standing in a class near the
door, stared in horror. Amongst them was Curly. His companions declared
afterwards that had it not been for the strength of the curl, his hair
would have stood upright. For, following Bruce, led in fact by a
string, came an awful apparition--Juno herself, a pitiable mass of
caninity--looking like the resuscitated corpse of a dog that had been
nine days buried, crowded with lumps, and speckled with cuts, going on
three legs, and having her head and throat swollen to a size past
recognition.

"She's no deid efter a'! Deil tak' her! for he's in her," said Doddles.

"We haena killed her eneuch," said Curly.

"I tell't ye, Curly! Ye had little ado to lowse the tow. She wad ha'
been as deid afore the mornin' as Lucky Gordon's cat that ye cuttit the
heid aff o'," said Linkum.

"Eh! but she luiks bonnie!" said Curly, trying to shake off his dismay.
"Man, we'll hae't a' to do ower again. Sic fun!"

But he could not help looking a little rueful when Linkum expressed a
wish that they were themselves well through with their share of the
killing.

And now the storm began to break. The master had gone to the door and
shaken hands with his visitor, glancing a puzzled interrogation at the
miserable animal in the string, which had just shape enough left to
show that it was a dog.

"I'm verra sorry, Maister Malison, to come to you wi' my complaints,"
said Bruce; "but jist luik at the puir dumb animal! She cudna come
hersel', an' sae I bude to bring her. Stan' still, ye brute!"

For Juno having caught sight of some boy-legs, through a corner of one