?" asked the Captain.

"A big Livonian blood-hound of mine, and my most intimate friend, with
the exception of Father Francis here."

"Birds of a feather," said the young priest. "Not that I class myself
with Doctors and blood-hounds. You should have allowed Tiger to give
those fellows a lesson they would remember, Danton. Their drunken
insolence is growing unbearable."

Dinner went on and ended. The ladies left the dining-room; the gentlemen
lingered, but not long.

Kate was at the piano entrancing Eeny, and Grace sat at her crochet.
Miss Danton got up and made tea, and the young Doctor lay back in an
arm-chair talking to Eeny, and watched, with half-closed eyes, the
delicate hands floating deftly along the fragile china cups.

"Give us some music, Kate," her father said, when it was over. "Grace,
put away your knitting, and be my partner in a game of whist. Father
Francis and the Doctor will stand no chance against us."

The quartet sat down. Kate's hands flew up and down the shining octaves
of her piano, and filled the room with heavenly harmony, the waves of
music that ebbed, and flowed, and fascinated. She played until the card
party broke up, and then she wheeled round on her stool.

"Who are the victors?" she asked.

"We are," said the Doctor. "When I make up my mind to win, I always win.
The victory rests solely with me."

"I'll vouch for your skill in cheating," said Grace. "Father Francis, I
am surprised that you countenance such dishonest proceedings."

"I wouldn't in any one but my partner," said the young priest, crossing
over to the piano. "Don't cease playing, Miss Danton. I am devotedly
fond of music, and it is very rarely indeed I hear such music as you
have given us to-night. You sing, do you not?"

"Sing!" exclaimed her father. "Kate sings like a nightingale. Sing us a
Scotch song, my dear."

"What shall it be, papa?"

"Anything. 'Auld Robin Gray,' if you like."

Kate sang the sweet old Scottish ballad with a pathos that went to every
heart.

"That is charming," said Father Francis. "Sing for me, now, Scots wha
hae."

She glanced up at him brightly; it was a favourite of her own, and she
sang it for him as he had never heard it sung before.

"Have you no favourite, Doctor Danton?" she asked, turning to him with
that dangerous smile of hers. "I want to treat all alike."

"Do you sing 'Hear me, Norma'?"

Her answer was the song. Then she arose from the instrument, and Father
Fra