beckoned me with a crooked forefinger.

"Who's wean is that, think ye, Hamish, that Belle brought here?"

"I think you should be asking Belle," said I.

"Ask here or ask there," says Betty, "the wean has a look o'—dinna be feart, my lad—the wean has the look o' John o' Scaurdale. And that," says she, "would be fair scandalous."

But after Betty's jalousing I had a word or two with Dan McBride, my cousin.

"Wean," says he, "and Betty thinks the bairn has a look o' John o' Scaurdale. It beats me, the cleverness of that woman. This is the story I got from Belle, Hamish. It's a little dreich, but it will be as well that ye should ken."

"Well," says Dan, "when ye were at the College in the toon and learning yer tasks, there was a lass came to stop at Scaurdale, a niece she was to the Laird there (a sister's wean, I am thinking), very prim and bonny she was, and fu' o' nonsensical book-lore. She took a liking to the place, and there are some that pretend to ken, that say she took mair than a liking to the Laird's son. I would not say for that; he was a brisk lad for so douce a lady. Well, well, Hamish, they cast out, and away goes the lass in a huff to her ain folk, and then back comes the word o' her wedding (some South-country birkie her man was, o' the name o' Stockdale, if I mind it right), and when that word came, John o' Scaurdale's son was like to go out at the rigging. We'll say naething about that, Hamish; ye ken what came on him: his horse threw him at the Laird's Turn yonder, and he never steered—he was by wi' it."

"What has this to do with Belle's wean?" said I.

"Belle's wean! Man, Belle never had a wean. That bairn is Stockdale's; and I'm hearing," said he, "that Scaurdale's niece, the mother of it, sent word to her uncle to take away the bairn, for her man turned out an ill-doer, and it's like she would be feart. But I ken this much, Hamish, Belle is waiting word from Scaurdale, and," says he, "they ken all the outs and ins of it, our friends here, and whenever it will be safe the wean will go to John o' Scaurdale."

"Scaurdale is not so far from here," said I. "Could Belle not have taken the bairn there at the first go off?"

"I thought ye had mair heid, Hamish. There's aye plenty o' gossips in the world, and Scaurdale will want this business kept quiet."

"In plain words," said I, "the wean has been stolen away from her father with the mother's help."

"That's just it precisely, Hamish; and what better place could she be hidden than here, with Scaurdale and your uncle so very friendly, and this so quiet a place?"

CHAPTER III.

IN WHICH I CHASE DEER AND SEE STRANGE HORSEMEN ON THE HILL, AND A LIGHT FLASHING ON THE SEA.

The corn was in the stackyard and the stacks thatched, and all that summer Belle and her wean stayed with us, the lass working at the weeding and the harvesting, and the wean well cared for, for the mistress remained not long abed after the spaewife's coming. Belle's wean might be "a tinker's brat" in whispered corners in byres and hay-sheds, where the wenches could claver out of hearing, but the Laird's son got no better attention than the tinker's brat when the mistress was near.

And now that the corn was secure and the stackyard full, the deer came down from the hills and lay close to till nightfall, and then wrought havoc in the turnip-drills, and I noticed that, like cows in a field of grain, they spoiled more crop than they ate, both of potatoes and turnips; and, indeed, it angered a man to see his good root-crops haggled and thrawn with the thin-flanked beasts, like the lean cattle, and I thought to go round the hill dyke with the dogs on an October evening, and harry them back to their heather and bracken again.

It was early in the evening, so I took my stick and daunered to the hay-shed (which was next to the planting) behind the stackyard, for I liked the noise of the wood, and would lie on the hay and listen to the scurry of the rabbits, the rippling note of the cushats in the tree-tops, and watch for the coming of the white owls that flitted among the trees. And as I lay on the sweet-smelling clovery hay there came over me a drowsiness, for I had been early abroad, and I dovered and dovered till sleep and waking were mingled, and strange voices came into my ears; and then I knew the voices, and felt myself go hot all over, for I could not move or I would be discovered with the rustling of the hay.

"I have waited long for ye, my bonny dark lass, waited when I was shivering to take ye in my arms," and I could see Dan lean forward and look into Belle's black eyes, one great arm round her shoulders and his hand below her chin, and she was bonny, bonny in the blink o' the moon.

"Ye were a good lad," says she, smiling up at him; "it whiles made me angry ye would be so good, and I would be lying at night thinking ye had forgotten the gipsy lass, and would be assourying[1] wi' red-cheeked, long-legged farmer lassies; and then ye would be coming to my window and knocking, and I was glad, and listened and listened for ye to be coming, although ye would not be knowing from me at all, and I would be cold, cold to ye. . . ."

"My dear, it's news to me," cried he, in great wonder, "for never a knock did I knock," and his eyes were laughing down at her.

"What!" she cries; "what! And who would be daring?"

"That's just what I cannot say, for the lads think ye're no' canny some way, but maistly because the weemen hiv them under their thumbs, so I'm thinkin' it must just have been Hamish."

It was on the tip of my tongue to cry out at that, but I saw by his face that he could not help hurting gently whatever he liked, and he had no thought for me at all, but waited for the girl to speak. The great sombre eyes were looking up at him, and the moon glintin' on her teeth as, her red lips parted, a brown hand fluttered about the man's breast.

"You would be knocking. I am wantin' you to be knocking," she cried, "for I am only a wicked gipsy lass. . . ."

I saw the man stretch her back with a straightening of his arm; I saw the limber length of him, the lean flank and the curve of his chest, as he half lay on the hay.

"I am wishing ye to be knocking," he mimicked in a half-fierce, half-laughing voice, "for I am only a wicked gipsy lass"; and again, "My dear, my dear, I'm not seeing much wickedness in a' this, and so I must be creeping out and knockin' on a lass that will not be saying a civil word to me, let alone a kiss in the gloamin'."

"Oh," she lilted, "oh, so you would be knocking to that unkind lass;" and then in a far-away voice, "Will you be remembering that place where I found you, when I would be running a wild thing like a young foal? . . ."

"Bonnily, Belle, bonnily I mind ye—a long-legged, black-maned filly ye were, and the big eyes o' ye, I began to love ye then. . . ."

"It would be terrible and you lying in the stall beside your horse at that place, and them not going near you, and you only a boy. I will be dreaming of the horse tramping your face yet."

"I'll teach ye something better to be dreaming than that, dear lass, for I was only a boy then, and I was carrying a man's share o' French brandy, more shame to me. I had nae sense at all, to be lying beside the horse, and him a kittle brute too; but I'll aye be mindin' ye coorieing ower me, and greetin' for a' that, when the men o' the Seagull were feart tae venture into the stall, being sailors and strange wi' horse."

Among the hay there I remembered the loud voices and