true as the waters of her own loch.

She saw the fat, white pony presently, standing before the dry-stone dyke that shut in the garden of Darrach farm-house from the road, and she quickened her steps in order that she might reach it before he started out again, and might thus save him another stop on the steep ascent. That act was natural to her, if you like; for if at any time by her thought or speech or act she could help another, then she was happy indeed.

But David of the grim face and the silent tongue had got into the gig again, and the fat pony had ambled off before she could stop him. Presently they met where a little water-course merrily crossed the gravelly road, seeking its way to the Glenogle burn.

"Good-morning, David. I hope you are quite well. You had letters for Mrs. Maclure. Surely you are earlier than usual."

"It wass only a post-cairt from her niece, Jeanie Maclure, from the school at Govan sayin' she would come for the week-end maype," answered David, as if the matter were of moment to the whole glen. "Yes--there pe lots an' lots of letters. I hope yourself an' the General are fery well this mornin'."

"Thank you, we are," said Isla as she leaned against the shaft of the old cart, stroking the fat pony's yellow eldes, her eyes a little more bright and eager than usual.

David fingered the letters with outward and visible clumsiness, but he was most careful with them, and in all the years of his service he had never made a mistake with one or failed to deliver it to its proper recipient.

"Thank you, David; this is all I want," said Isla as her fingers closed over the thick letter enclosed in its foreign envelope. "Take the rest up to Achree. My father will be waiting for them."

"Yes, Miss Isla. That I will do, and hope it will pe good news from Maister Malcolm in foreign parts, an' that he will pe fery well."

"Thank you, David. He is sure to be well," said Isla, trying to speak lightly, but her fingers were nervously closing over the letter, and into her eyes there crept a strange shadow.

She had sometimes said that she had the gift of second sight which was so common among the Mackinnons. Certainly she knew before she opened that letter, about a hundred yards lower down the road, that it contained bad news. It was too thick to be of no consequence, for her brother Malcolm was no great letterwriter when times were easy and his credit good.

She nodded good-bye to David Bain and passed on, hastening more quickly than usual past the farm-house of Darrach, though there lived one of her best and most faithful friends in the whole glen--one Elspeth Mackay married to Donald Maclure, the big crofter who was respected in the glen, from end to end of it, as a man of his word.

But Elspeth's tongue was long and her eyes were very keen, and Isla was not ready for them yet. Therefore she hastened past the gate of Darrach, not even smiling as the rich, fine smell of Elspeth's baking was borne out through the open door. Down the hill a little way she came to the old brig that crossed the Darrach burn; and there she paused, for there was no one in sight and the slope hid her from view of Elspeth's windows.

She could never afterwards recall that half-hour by the Darrach Brig without an inward shudder.

Thus did Malcolm Mackinnon, the ne'er-do-weel, write airily and lightly, telling the miserable story that well nigh broke his sister's heart:--

"DEAR ISLA,--Last time you wrote me you hoped I would have better news to send next time. I'm sorry I can't comply. I seem to have the devil's own luck here in this beastly country. In fact, I may as well say at once that it's all up with me and that I'm coming home.

"I've never been very happy in the Thirty-fifth nor got on well with old Martindale. He's a beast, if ever there was one, a regular martinet, and unless you practise the whole art of sucking up to him you may as well give up the ghost, as far as any chance of promotion or even of fair play is concerned. Of course, no Mackinnon can suck up to anybody--we've got too much beastly pride. Anyway, I haven't been able to soft-sawder Martindale enough, and I have been in his black books ever since I joined. But it's got a lot worse in the last nine months.

"When I wrote the governor last year, asking him to use his influence to get me shifted, I was quite in earnest, and if he'd done it all this row might have been prevented. We've been up country a goodish bit since I wrote last, and there again I didn't get fair play or a bit of a chance. We've had several brushes with a hostile tribe, but the other chaps got their innings every time and nothing but the dirty work was left to me. We had such a lot of beastly, unnecessary fag on our marches that most of the chaps were on the verge of mutiny; but I was the only one with the courage to speak up. Whatever garbled version of the story may get home, you may take it from me, old girl, that is the bottom truth of it. Anyhow, I've got to send in my papers--that's the long and the short of it. All the chaps, except the few that suck up to Martindale, think I've been treated most beastly badly, and unjustly besides. But of course nobody listens to a poor subaltern's defence or excuse.

"By the time you get this I shall have started for home. I'm coming by the 'Jumna,' a rotten slow boat, but I think it better for many reasons--chiefly those of economy. I shall be pleased to see the old place again, and I hope the governor won't cut up too rough. Try and get the worst over for me before I come, because naturally I'm raw enough about the whole bally thing, and couldn't stand much more. Fact is, it's all right in a crack regiment for the chaps who have big allowances. There's only one word to fit the case of poor, hard-up beggars like me, and that one I mustn't use. Poverty opens the door to all sorts of mischief and misery that a girl who never needs any money can't begin to understand.

"I'd better make a clean breast of it while I'm at it, and you'll have time to digest it before I get home. I'm in with the money-lenders both in London and in Calcutta. I owe about two thousand pounds, and how it's to be paid is keeping me awake at night. Of course, it's been advanced on Achree, so heaven only knows what will be the upshot. I'll have to see that old starched stick Cattanach the minute I get back so that the old man may not be worried.

"If only I had the place in my own hands I'd make things hum a bit. You know, Isla, everything has been shockingly neglected in the last five years, and a perfect horde of pensioners have been kept off the poor old place. The half of them ought to be chucked; it's nothing but pauperizing the glen from end to end. A bit more could be screwed out of the tenants, as most of them have their places dirt-cheap.

"Well, old girl, I'm beastly sorry, for you can't be expected to like this. But suspend your judgment, for really I'm not half so bad as I'm painted, and if I had only half a chance I might prove it to you. I must try and get somebody to introduce me to the Stock Exchange. That seems to be the only way of turning an honest penny nowadays. There are hundreds of military men on it.

"Don't be too downhearted over this. You are such a one for taking things seriously, and there's hardly anything in life worth worrying about, really. You have the best of it, for nobody expects anything of a girl, and she