nd out at any rate," she remembered, "when I go
for the peats and things at Hogmanay."

"It needna be," eagerly replied Tommy. "I'll bring them to you in a
barrow in the dead o' night."

"Could you?" she cried passionately, and he promised he would, and it
may be mentioned here that he did.

"And what for yoursel'?" she inquired.

"A bawbee," he said, "the night afore the Muckley."

The bargain was made, but before he could get away, "Tell me, laddie,"
said Meggy, coaxingly, "has Kitty Elshioner joined?" They were all as
curious to know who had joined as they were anxious to keep their own
membership a secret; but Tommy betrayed none, at least none who agreed
to his proposal. There were so many of these that on the night before
the Muckley he had thirteen pence.

"And you was doing good all the time you was making the thirteen pence,"
Elspeth said, fondly. "I believe that was the reason you did it."

"I believe it was!" Tommy exclaimed. He had not thought of this before,
but it was easy to him to believe anything.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE MUCKLEY

Every child in Thrums went to bed on the night before the Muckley
hugging a pirly, or, as the vulgar say, a money-box; and all the pirlies
were ready for to-morrow, that is to say, the mouths of them had been
widened with gully knives by owners now so skilful at the jerk which
sends their contents to the floor that pirlies they were no longer.
"Disgorge!" was the universal cry, or, in the vernacular, "Out you come,
you sweer deevils!"

Not a coin but had its history, not a boy who was unable to pick out his
own among a hundred. The black one came from the 'Sosh, the bent lad he
got for carrying in Ronny-On's sticks. Oh michty me, sure as death he
had nearly forgotten the one with the warts on it. Which to spend first?
The goldy one? Na faags, it was ower ill to come by. The scartit one?
No, no, it was a lucky. Well, then, the one found in the rat's hole?
(That was a day!) Ay, dagont, ay, we'll make the first blatter with it.

It was Tommy's first Muckley, and the report that he had thirteen pence
brought him many advisers about its best investment. Even Corp Shiach
(five pence) suspended hostilities for this purpose. "Mind this," he
said solemnly, "there's none o' the candies as sucks so long as
Californy's Teuch and Tasty. Other kinds may be sweeter, but Teuch and
Tasty lasts the longest, and what a grip it has! It pulls out your
teeth!" Corp seemed to think