It was peaceful enough there. No one was in the kitchen, and after a moment's hesitation she crossed the little pa.s.sage and knocked at the parlour-door. No response being given, she pushed it gently open and looked into the room. The two youngest boys were amusing themselves with their playthings in a corner, and Marjorie lay on her couch with her doll and her doll's wardrobe, and a book or two within reach of her hand. The tiny little face brightened at the sight of the mistress.

"Come away in, Mistress Jamieson. I am very glad to see you," said she, with a tone and manner so exactly like what her mother's might have been, that the mistress could not but smile a little with amus.e.m.e.nt as well as with pleasure. "My father and mother are both away from home to-day; but they will soon be back now, and you'll just bide till they come, will you not?"

Mistress Jamieson acknowledged herself to be in no special haste, and sitting down, she made advances toward an interchange of greetings with the little boys. Wee Wattie, not quite four years old, came forward boldly enough, and submitted to be lifted to her knee. But Norman, aged five, had been once or twice sent to the school, with his brothers, when his absence was convenient at home, and certain unpleasant recollections of such times made him a little shy of meeting her friendly advances.

Even Robin and Jack had been in their day afraid of the mistress and her tawse. But Marjorie had never been at the school, and had always seen her in her best mood in the manse parlour. She had had rather a dull afternoon with but her little brothers for company, for Allie was busy, and had only looked in now and then to see that the little ones had got into no mischief. So the child was truly pleased to see the mistress, and showed it; and so Mistress Jamieson was pleased, also, and in the best of humour for the afternoon.

And this was a fortunate thing for Marjorie. For she had many questions in her mind which no one could answer so well as the mistress--questions about the reading of one child and of the "weaving" of another, and of the well-doing or ill-doing of many besides. For though she did not see the bairns of the town very often, she knew them all, and took great interest in all that concerned them.

She knew some things about the bairns of the school which the mistress did not know herself, and which, on the whole, it was as well she should not know. So when, in the case of one of them, they seemed to be approaching dangerous ground, and Mrs Jamieson's face began to lengthen and to take the set, which to Marjorie, who had only heard about it, looked ominous of trouble to some one, the child turned the talk toward other matters.

"I must show you my stocking," said she, opening a basket which stood within reach of her hand. "It is not done so ill for a beginner, my mother says. But it is slow work. I like the flowering of muslin better, but mother says too much of it is no' good for the een. And it is quite proper that every one should ken how to make stockings, especially one with so many brothers as I have."

The stocking was duly examined and admired. It had been the work of months, done in "stents" of six or eight times round in a day, and it was well done "for a beginner." There were no mended botches, and no traces of "hanging hairs and holey pies," which so often vexed the very heart of the mistress in the work of some of the "careless hizzies" whom she was trying to teach. She praised it highly, but she looked at the child and wondered whether she would live to finish it. There was no such thought in the mind of Marjorie.

"Mother says that making stockings becomes a pleasant and easy kind of work when one grows old. And though I canna just say that I like it very well. I must try and get on with it, for it is one of the things that must be learned young, ye ken."

"Ay, that's true. And what folk can do weel, they ay come to like to do in course o' time," said the mistress encouragingly. "I only wish that Annie Cairns and Jeannie Robb could show work as weel done."

"Oh! but they are different," said the child, a sudden shadow falling on her face. "If I could run about as they can, I would maybe no' care about other things."

"Puir wee lammie!" said the mistress.

"Oh! but I'm better than I used to be," said Marjorie, eagerly; "a great deal better. And I'll maybe be well and strong some day, our Allie says."

"G.o.d grant it, my dear," said the mistress reverently.

"And I have some things to enjoy that the other bairns havena. See, I have gotten a fine new book here," said Marjorie, mindful of her mother's warning about speaking much of her trouble to other folk.

"It's a book my father brought home to my mother the last time he was away. I might read a bit of it to you."

"Ay, do ye that. I will like weel to hear you."

It was "The Course of Time," a comparatively new book in those days, and one would think a dreary enough one for a child. It was a grand book to listen to, when her mother read it to her father, Marjorie thought, and she liked the sound of some of it even when she read it to herself. And it was the sound of it that the mistress liked as she listened, at least she was not thinking of the sense, but of the ease and readiness with which the long words glided from the child's lips. It was about "the sceptic" that she was reading--the man who had striven to make this fair and lovely earth.

"A cold and fatherless, forsaken thing that wandered on forlorn, undestined, unaccompanied, unupheld"; and the mistress had a secret fear that if the child should stumble among the long words and ask for help, she might not be able to give it without consideration.

"Ay, it has a fine sound," said she, as Marjorie made a pause. "But I wad ken better how ye're comin' on wi' your readin' gin ye were to tak'

the New Testament."

There was a tradition among the old scholars that, in the early days of her experience as a teacher, the mistress used to make a little pause before committing herself in the utterance of some of the long words in the Bible; if it were so, that time was long past. But before Marjorie had opened the book, Allison came in, to mend the fire and put things to rights; and as the books had only been intended as a diversion from unpleasant possibilities, they were gladly and quickly put aside.

"This is our Allie, mistress," said Marjorie, putting out her hand to detain her friend as she pa.s.sed.

"Ay, ay. I ken that. I hae seen her at the kirk and elsewhere," said the mistress, rather stiffly.

"And she is so strong and kind," said the child, laying her cheek on the hand that had been put forth to smooth her pillow, which had fallen aside.

Mistress Jamieson had seen "the new la.s.s" often, but she had never seen on her face the look that came on it at the loving movement of the child.

"Are ye wearyin' for your tea, dear? It's late, and I doubt they needed to go on all the way to Slapp, as they thought they might, and maybe they winna be home this while."

A shadow fell on the face of the child. Allison regarded her gravely.

"Never heed, my lammie. I'll take the wee laddies into the kitchen, and ye can make tea for the mistress and your brothers if they come in.

You'll like that, dear."

Marjorie brightened wonderfully. She ay liked what made her think she was able to do as other folk did. The mistress rose, excusing herself for having been beguiled into staying so long.

"And what would my mistress say if we were to let ye away without your tea?" asked Allison, with great respect and gravity.

Then Robin came in, and he added his word, and to tell the truth the mistress was well pleased to be persuaded. She and Robin were on the friendliest terms now, though there had been "many a tulzie" between them in the old days. For Robin, though quieter than Jack, and having the reputation of being "a douce and sensible laddie" elsewhere, had been, during the last days of his subjection to Mistress Jamieson, "as fou o' mischief as an egg is fou o' meat," and she had been glad enough to see the last of him as a scholar. But all that had been long forgotten and forgiven. Robin behaved to her with the greatest respect and consideration, "now that he had gotten some sense," and doubtless when he should distinguish himself in college, as he meant to do, the mistress would take some of the credit of his success to herself, and would hold him up as an example to his brothers as persistently as she had once held him up as a warning.

To-night they were more than friendly, and did not fall out of conversation of the most edifying sort, Marjorie putting in her word now and then. All went well till wee Wattie took a fit of coughing, and Norman followed in turn; and then Mistress Jamieson told them of her proposed expedition to the Stanin' Stanes, for the benefit of all the bairns, if the day should prove fine.

Marjorie leaned back in her chair, clasping her hands and looking at her brother with eager entreaty in her eyes. But Robin would not meet her look. For Marjorie had a way of taking encouragement to hope for the attainment of impossible things when no encouragement was intended, and then when nothing came of it, her disappointment was as deep as her hopes had been high.

Then she turned her eyes to the mistress, but resisted the impulse to speak. She knew that her words would be sympathetic and encouraging, but that it must end in words as far as she was concerned.

"And it's ay best to go straight to my mother," said Marjorie to herself, remembering past experiences; "and there will be time enough to speak in the morning if the day should be fine."

So she wisely put the thought of the morrow away, and took the good of the present. And she had her reward. Warned by Robin, Allie said not a word of what awaited the school bairns next day, though the little boys discussed it eagerly in the kitchen. So, when the mother came home, she found her little daughter quietly asleep, which was not often the case when anything had happened to detain her father and mother from home later than was expected.

But though Allison said nothing, she thought all the more about the pleasure which the child so longed to enjoy with the rest. Before she slept, she startled her mistress not a little, entering of her own free will into an account of the schoolmistress' plan to take the bairns to the hills for the sake of their health, and ending by asking leave to take little Marjorie to "the Stanin' Stanes" with the rest. She spoke as quietly as if she had been asking a question about the morning's breakfast, and waited patiently for her answer. Mrs Hume listened doubtfully.

"I hope she has not been setting her heart upon it. It will be a sad disappointment to her."

"If it must be a disappointment. No, we have had no words about it.

But she heard it from the mistress. It wad be as good for her as for the other bairns."

"I fear it would not be wise to try it. And she can hardly have set her heart upon going, or she would not be sleeping so quietly."

"It would do her good," persisted Allison.

"And you could trust her with Allison, and Robin might meet them and carry the child home," said the minister.

Mrs Hume turned to him in surprise. When the minister sat down in the parlour to take a half-hour's recreation with a book, he became, as far as could be observed, quite unconscious of all that might be going on around him, which was a fortunate circ.u.mstance for all concerned, considering the dimensions of the house, and the number of people in it.

But never a word, which touched his little daughter, escaped him, however much his book might interest him.

"You would take good care of her, Allison?" repeated he.

"Ay, that I would."

"If it were a possible thing that she could go I would not be afraid to trust her with Allison. But the risk of harm would be greater than the good she could get, or the pleasure."

"It is a long road, and I doubt ye might weary, Allison," said the minister.

"I hae carried hame lost lammies, two, and whiles three o' them, a langer road over the hills than the road to the Stanin' Stanes. Ay, whiles I grew weary, but what of that?" said Allison, with an animation of face and voice that astonished them both.

"Well! We'll sleep on it. A wise plan at most times when doubtful questions are being considered."