sir? He’ll kill ye yet if ye don’t take care. Be warned!”

“Well,” said Craig, laughing, “he is a scientific boxer, and he hurt me a bit, but I think I’ve given him a drubbing he won’t soon forget.”

“No,” said Sandie significantly; “he—won’t—forget. Take my word for that.”

“Well, Sandie, come up to the old inn, and we’ll have a glass together.”

For a whole fortnight Laird Fletcher was confined to his rooms before he felt fit to be seen.

“A touch of neuralgia,” he made his housekeeper tell all callers.

But he couldn’t and dared not refuse to see Shufflin’ Sandie when he sent up his card—an old envelope that had passed through the post-office.

“Well,” said the Laird, “to what am I indebted for the honour of this visit?”

“Come off that high horse, sir,” said Sandie, “and speak plain English. I’ll tell you,” he added, “I’ll tell you in a dozen words. I’m going to build a small house and kennels, and I’m going to marry Fanny—the bonniest lassie in all the world, sir. Ah! won’t I be happy, just!”

He smiled, and took a pinch, then offered the box to the Laird.

The Laird dashed it aside.

“What in thunder?” he roared, “has your house or marriage to do with me?”

“Ye’ll soon see that, my Laird. I want forty pounds, or by all the hares on Bilberry Hill I’ll go hot-foot to the Fiscal, for I heard your threat to Craig Nicol by the riverside.”

Half-an-hour afterwards Shufflin’ Sandie left the Laird to mourn, but Sandie had got forty pounds nearer to the object of his ambition, and was happy accordingly.

As he rode away, the horse’s hoofs making music that delighted his ear, Sandie laughed aloud to himself.

“Now,” he thought, “if I could only just get about fifty pounds more, I’d begin building. Maybe the old Laird’ll help me a wee bit; but I must have it, and I must have Fanny. My goodness! how I do love the lassie! Her every look or glance sends a pang to my heart. I cannot bear it; I shall marry Fanny, or into the deepest, darkest kelpie’s pool in the Dee I’ll fling myself.

“‘O love, love! Love is like a dizziness,
That winna let a poor body go about his bus-i-ness.’”

Shufflin’ Sandie was going to prove no laggard in love. But his was a thoroughly Dutch peasant’s courtship.

He paid frequent visits by train to the Granite City, to make purchases for the good old Laird McLeod. And he never returned without a little present for Fanny. It might be a bonnie ribbon for her hair, a bottle of perfume, or even a bag of choice sweets. But he watched the chance when Fanny was alone in the kitchen to slip them into her hand half-shyly.

Once he said after giving her a pretty bangle:

“I’m not so very, very ugly, am I, Fanny?”

“’Deed no, Sandie!”

“And I’m not so crooked and small as they would try to make me believe. Eh, dear?”

“’Deed no, Sandie, and I ay take your part against them all. And that you know, Sandie.”

How sweet were those words to Sandie’s soul only those who love, but are in doubt, may tell.

“Tis sweet to love, but sweeter far
    To be beloved again;
But, ah! how bitter is the pain
    To love, yet love in vain!”

“Ye haven’t a terrible lot of sweethearts, have you, Fanny?”

“Well, Sandie, I always like to tell the truth; there’s plenty would make love to me, but I can’t bear them. There’s ploughman Sock, and Geordie McKay. Ach! and plenty more.”

She rubbed away viciously at the plate she was cleaning.

“And I suppose,” said Sandie, “the devil a one of them has one sixpence to rub against another?”

“Mebbe not,” said Fanny. “But, Fanny—”

“Well, Sandie?”

“I—I really don’t know what I was going to say, but I’ll sing it.”

Sandie had a splendid voice and a well-modulated one.

“My love is like a red, red rose,
    That’s newly sprung in June;
My love is like a melody,
    That’s sweetly played in tune.

“As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
    So deep in love am I;
And I will love you still, my dear,
    Till a’ the seas go dry.

“Till a’ the seas go dry, my lass,
    And the rocks melt with the sun;
Yes, I will love you still, my dear,
    Till sands of life are run.”

The tears were coursing down the bonnie lassie’s cheeks, so plaintive and sweet was the melody.

“What! ye’re surely not crying, are ye?” said Sandie, approaching and stretching one arm gently round her waist.

“Oh, no, Sandie; not me!”

But Sandie took the advantage, and kissed her on the tear-bedewed cheeks.

She didn’t resist.

“I say, Fanny—”

“Yes, Sandie.”

“It’ll be a bonnie night to-night, the moon as bright as day. Will you steal out at eight o’clock and take a wee bit walk with me? Just meet me on the hill near Tammie Gibb’s ruined cottage. I’ve something to tell you.”

“I’ll—I’ll try,” said Fanny, blushing a little, as all innocent Scotch girls do.

Sandie went off now to his work as happy as the angels.

And Fanny did steal out that night. Only for one short hour and a half. Oh, how short the time did seem to Sandie!

It is not difficult to guess what Sandie had to tell her.

The old, old story, which, told in a thousand different ways, is ever the same, ever, ever new.

And he told her of his prospects, of the house—a but and a ben, or two rooms—he was soon to build, and his intended kennels, though he would still work for the Laird.

“Will ye be my wife? Oh, will you, Fanny?”

“Yes.”

It was but a whispered word, but it thrilled Sandie’s heart with joy.

“My ain dear dove!” he cried, folding her in his arms.

They were sitting on a mossy bank close by the forest’s edge.

Their lips met in one long, sweet kiss.

Yes, peasant love I grant you, but I think it was leal and true.

“They might be poor—Sandie and she;
    Light is the burden love lays on;
Content and love bring peace and joy.
    What more have queens upon a throne?”

Homeward through the moonlight, hand-in-hand, went the rustic lovers, and parted at the gate as lovers do.

Sandie was kind of dazed with happiness. He lay awake nearly all the livelong night, till the cocks began to crow, wondering how on earth he was to raise the other fifty pounds and more that should complete his happiness. Then he dozed off into dreamland.

He was astir, all the same, at six