lying there.
Another blow! Managing to dodge Willie, he hurried home to meet
the second morning delivery. Nothing again! . . . His mother's
anxious questions as to his health irritated him, and he so far
lost his temper as to ask his sister why she was wearing a face
like a fiddle. Poor Jeannie! For half the night she had been
weeping for her hero and wishing the most awful things for the
unknown Maggie.

'Ye'll be back for yer denner, laddie?' his mother called after him
as he left the house.

'I dinna ken,' he replied over his shoulder.

Mrs. Robinson felt that her worst forebodings were about to be
realized.

'Never again!' she muttered in the presence of her daughter, who
was helping her with the housework.

'What, mither?'

'Never again will I open a paircel that's no addressed to me.'

'But it--it might ha'e been a--a fish,' said Jeannie, who would
have sought to comfort the most sinful penitent in the world. 'Some
girls,' she went on, 'dinna mean onything special by "fondest
love." They dinna mean onything mair nor "kind regairds."'

Mrs. Robinson sighed. 'I wud gi'e something if it had been a fish
wi' kind regairds. I wonder what he did wi' the socks.'

'I got them at the back o' the chest o' drawers. Weel, mither,
that proves he doesna care for her.'

'That's no the p'int, dearie.' Mrs. Robinson paused in her work.
'I'm beginnin' to think I should ha'e tell't him aboot the paircel
bein' open when Christina was here. It's maybe no fair to let him
gang to her----'

'I'll run efter him,' said Jeannie promptly. 'I'll maybe catch him
afore he gets to Miss Tod's shop.'

'Ay; run, Jeannie; run as quick's ye can!'

So Jeannie threw off her apron, tidied her hair with a couple of
touches, and flew as though a life depended on her speed.

And, panting, she came in sight of Miss Tod's shop just in
time--just in time to see the beloved kilted figure disappear into
the doorway.

XIX

A SERIOUS REVERSE

The fact that Christina had not written was a paralyzing blow to
Macgregor's self-confidence and left him altogether uncertain of
his ground. For the time being his sense of guilt as well as that
of injury was almost swamped by the awful dread that she had simply
grown tired of him. He entered the shop with foreboding--and
received another blow.

A smartly dressed young man was lounging at the counter, apparently
basking in Christina's smiles. As a matter of fact, the young man