"Are ye feared at the folk, Allie? They ay mean it for kindness. But I like the lane, too. And maybe my mother will let us come and see Mrs Beaton next time."

The end of Mrs Beaton's house skirted the green, and so did the narrow strip of garden which was behind it. The road home was as short the one way as the other. If they crossed the green toward the right it took them to the street, and if they turned the other way they took the path behind the gardens, or rather the kail-yards of the houses on the street. Before they entered this path they turned to take a last look of the long, snowy slope of the hills with the sunshine on them.

"The snow is pleasanter just to look at than to wade about in," said Allison.

"But, Allison, that is because ye dinna ken. O! I would like weel to wade about in it, as the other bairns do."

"O! I ken fine what it is like. I have been in far deeper snaw whiles, following the sheep--"

"Have ye, Allie? But ye dinna ken what it would be like never to have put your foot in the snaw all your life. Think of that, Allie. But never mind. Tell me about following the sheep through the drifts."

But the shadow, which the child had learned to know, had fallen on Allison's face, and she answered nothing.

"Never mind, Allie dear, I'll tell you something. Do ye ken what that little housie is? It has neither door nor window. There is a hole on this side that is shut with a board. But it is a nice place. I have been in it whiles. That is the place where John Beaton makes headstones when he's no' away building houses on the other side of Aberdeen."

"Do ye mean stanes for the kirkyard?"

"Just that. He's a clever lad, John. He can do many things, Robin says. He's Robin's friend."

"It maun be dreary wark."

"But that wouldna trouble John. He's strong and cheerful, and I like him weel. He's wise, and he's kind. He tells me about folk that he has seen, and places and things. And whiles he sings to me, and I like him best after my father and mother and my brothers--and you," added Marjorie, glancing up at Allison. "I'm no' sure which o' the two I like best. I'll ken better when I see you together. Ye're the bonniest far!" said the child, fondly patting the cheek, to which the soft wind blowing upon it had brought a splendid colour. "Did Mrs Beaton never tell you about 'My John'?"

"Oh! ay. But I dinna mind about it. I wasna heedin'."

"But ye'll like him when ye see him," said Marjorie.

The mother was watching for them when they reached home, and Robin was there too. It was Robin who took the child from Allison and carried her in.

"Oh, mother! I have been over the burn, and I've seen the hills all covered with snow and the sun shining on them, and it was beautiful.

And I'm not just so very tired. Are ye tired, Allie?"

"What would tire me? I would like to carry ye ilka (every) day to the top o' Win'hill. It might do ye good."

Robin had never heard Allison say so many words at a time before.

"It has done Allie good, at any rate," said he as he seated himself by the parlour fire and began to take off his little sister's wraps. Then he took off her shoes and stockings "to warm her bonny wee footies," as he said.

"Has it done her good? I'm glad o' that," said Marjorie, "for Allie has had sore trouble, I'm nearly sure. She forgets me whiles, even when she has me in her arms, and her face changes, and her een look as if she were seein' things no' there."

"My dear!" said her mother. "It might vex Allie for you to be watching her face, and speaking about it, since she has never said a word about her troubles to you."

"Oh, mother! It is only to you and Robin. Do you think I would speak about my Allie to other folk?" and the tears came into the child's eyes.

"Now, Maysie," said her brother, "when ye begin to look like that, I ay ken that ye're tired and likely to grow fractious and ill to do with.

So you must just lie still in my arms, and I'll sing ye to sleep. What shall I sing? The _La.s.s o' Glenshee_? or _The Lord's my Shepherd_?"

It was not long before the child was sleeping sweetly on her little couch, nor did the flush which her mother so dreaded to see, and which too often followed any unusual excitement, come to her cheeks as she slept. She slept well at night also, and nothing could be clearer than that the long walk had done her no harm, but good.

So, a precedent being established, Marjorie had many a walk after that.

Sometimes she was allowed to spend an hour with Mrs Beaton, or auld Maggie, or some other friend, and at such times Allison would leave her and return for her again. It cannot be said that her limbs grew much stronger, or that the dull pain in the weary little back troubled her no more. But the change gave her new thoughts and new interests, and rested her when she grew weary of her doll, and her books, and of the quiet of the parlour, and sometimes even of her mother's company.

But when the days grew long and warm, there were even better things in store for her, and for Allison also, through her tender care of the child.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

"The spring cam' o'er the Westlin hill, And the frost it fled awa', And the green gra.s.s lookit smilin' up Nane the waur for a' the snaw."

The winter had been so long in coming and so moist and mild when it came, that weatherwise folk foretold a spring late and cold as sure to follow. But for once they were all mistaken. Whatever might come later, there came, when April had fairly set in, several days which would have done credit to June itself, and on one of these days the schoolmistress made up her mind that she would go down to the manse and speak to the minister's wife about the bairns.

She was standing at her own door, looking out over the hills, which were showing some signs of coming summer. So were the birch-trees in the distance, and the one laburnum which stood in a corner of Mistress Beaton's garden. She sighed as she gazed.

"The simmer will soon be here, and it'll soon be over again. It's but a blink noo," she said to herself, "but if the morn is like this day, we'll mak' the best o' it. I'se hae the bairns up to the Stanin'

Stanes. The wind there will blaw awa' what's left o' the kink-hoast among them. They'll be a' keen eneuch to get there for the sake o' the ploy, and if they're weel eneuch for the like o' that, their mithers will hardly hae the face to keep them langer frae the school. And it is high time they were comin' back again," added she, thinking less, perhaps, of their loss of lore than of the additional penny a week which each returning one would bring to her limited housekeeping.

She was a tall, gaunt woman, with a wrinkled, unhappy-looking face and weary eyes. Her grey hair showed a little under the mob cap, closely bound round her head with a broad, black ribbon, and her spectacles, tied with a string for safety, rested high on her furrowed forehead.

She wore the usual petticoat of dark winsey, and her short gown of some dark-striped print fell a little below the knee. A large cotton kerchief was spread over her shoulders and fastened snugly across her breast. Her garments were worn and faded, but perfectly neat and clean, and she looked, as she was, a decent, but not very cheery old woman.

She had an uncertain temper, her friends allowed, and even those who were not so friendly acknowledged that "her lang warstle wi' the bairns o' twa generations, to say nothing of other troubles that had fallen to her lot, might weel account for, and even excuse that."

She turned into the house at last, and began gathering together the dog-eared Bibles and Testaments, and the tattered catechisms, and "Proverbs of Solomon," which were the only books approved or used in her school, and placed them in a wooden tray by the door. She gave a brief examination to the stockings which the la.s.sies had been knitting in the afternoon, muttering and shaking her head as she held them up to the light. The mistakes in some of them she set right, and from some of them she pulled out the "wires," sticking them into the b.a.l.l.s of worsted, with some antic.i.p.atory pleasure at the thought of the consternation of the "careless hizzies" to whom they belonged.

Then the forms were set back, and "the tawse," a firm belt of leather, cut into strips at one end--by no means the least important of the educational helps of the time and place--was hung in its usual conspicuous position, and then the school-room, which was also the whole house, was supposed to be in order for the night.

It was a dismal little place, having a small window on the side next the street, and a still smaller one on the other. There was the inevitable box-bed on the side opposite the fireplace, and the equally inevitable big brown chest for clothing, and bedding, and all other household valuables that needed a touch of "the smith's fingers" for safety.

There was the meal-chest, and a tiny cupboard for dishes and food, and on a high dresser, suggestive of more extensive housekeeping operations than the mistress had needed for many a year and day, were piled a number of chairs and other articles not needed in the school.

A dismal place, but it was her own, till morning should bring the bairns again. So she mended the peat fire into a brighter glow, and seated herself beside it, to take the solace of her pipe, after the worries and weariness of the day.

A pleasant sound put an end to her meditations. From under the chair which stood near the little window at the head of the box-bed, came, with stately step, a big, black hen, announcing, with triumphant cackle, that _her_ duty was done for the day also. The mistress rose and took the warm egg from the nest.

"Weel dane, Tappie! Ye'se get your supper as ye deserve, and then I maun awa' to the manse." So she scattered her scanty supply of crumbs about the door, and then prepared herself for her visit.

If she had been going to the manse by special invitation, she would have put on her Sabbath-day's gown and shawl, and all the folk would have known it as she went up the street. But as she was going on business, she only changed her mutch, and her kerchief and ap.r.o.n, and putting her key in its accustomed hole in the thatch, she went slowly down the street, knitting, or, as she would have called it, "weaving," as she went.

She had not very far to go, but two or three greetings she got and returned as she pa.s.sed. "Mistress Jamieson," the neighbours called her to her face, but she knew quite well that behind her back she was just called Bell c.u.mmin, her maiden name, as was the way among the humbler cla.s.s of folk in these parts. They all paid her a certain measure of respect, but she was not a favourite among them, for she was silent and sour, and sometimes over-ready to take offence, and her manner was not over-friendly at the best of times.

At the entrance of the close which led to the back door of the manse stood the weaver's wife from next door, and with her a woman with whom the mistress was not always on speaking terms. This was the wife of tailor Coats, who spent, as the schoolmistress had once told her, more time on the causey (pavement) than was good either for herself or her bairns. She would fain have pa.s.sed her now without speaking, but that was not the intention of Mistress Coats.

"The minister's nae at hame, nor the mistress," said she, "and since ye hae lost your journey, ye micht as weel come in and hae a crack (talk) with Mistress Sim and me, and gie's o' your news."

"I dinna deal in news, and I hae nae time for cracks and clavers."

"Dear me! and sae few bairns as ye hae noo at the schule. Gin ye could but learn them their samplers noo, or even just plain sewing, ye might keep the la.s.sies thegither for a whilie langer. But their mithers man hae them taucht to use their needles, and it canna be wonnered at."

This was a sore subject with the mistress, who was no needle-woman, and she turned, ready with a sharp answer. But the smile on the woman's face, and the look of expectation on the more friendly face of Mistress Sim, served as a warning, and calling her discretion to her help, she turned at once into the manse.