in however slight a way.

'Maggie,' said Miss Douglas (and the beautiful wide-apart eyes were full of a shy apology), 'was feeling a little lonely, and I did not like to leave her.'

'But if I had known,' said he, 'I would not have stayed so late. The gentleman that is come about the shooting is a curious man; it's no the salmon and the grouse and the deer he wants to know about only; it's everything in the country. Now, Maggie, lass, get ye to bed. And I will see you down the road, Miss Douglas.'

'Indeed there is no need for that,' said Meenie, with downcast eyes.

'Would ye have a bogle run away with ye?' he said good-naturedly.

And so she bade good-night to the little Maggie, and took up some books and drawings she had brought to beguile the time withal; and then she went out into the clear night, followed by the young gamekeeper.

And what a night it was—or rather, might have been—for two lovers! The wide waters of the loch lay still and smooth, with a broad pathway of silver stretching away into the dusk of the eastern hills; not a breath of wind stirred bush or tree; and if Ben Clebrig in the south was mostly a bulk of shadow, far away before them in the northern skies rose the great shoulders of Ben Loyal, pallid in the moonlight, the patches of snow showing white up near the stars. They had left behind them the little hamlet—which merely consisted of a few cottages and the inn; they were alone in this pale silent world. And down there, beneath the little bridge, ran the placid Mudal Water: and if they had a Bible with them?—and would stand each on one side of the stream?—and clasp hands across? It was a night for lovers' vows.

'Maggie is getting on well with her lessons,' the pretty young lady said, in that gentle voice of hers. 'She is very diligent.'

'I'm sure I'm much obliged to ye, Miss Douglas,' was the respectful answer, 'for the trouble ye take with her. It's an awkward thing to be sae far from a school. I'm thinking I'll have to send her to my brother in Glasgow, and get her put to school there.'

'Oh, indeed, indeed,' said she, 'that will be a change now. And who will look after the cottage for you, Ronald?'

She addressed him thus quite naturally, and without shyness; for no one ever dreamed of calling him anything else.

'Well, I suppose Mrs. MacGregor will give the place a redd[#] up from time to time. But a keeper has but half learned his business that canna shift for himself; there's some of the up-country lodges with ne'er a woman-body within a dozen miles o' them.'