ering, that she did not care much about anything, least of all about
herself.

Innumerable were the instructions in propriety of behaviour which she
gave the boys in prospect of this visit. The probability being that
they would behave just as well as at home, these instructions were
considerably unnecessary, for Mrs. Falconer was a strict enforcer of all
social rules. Scarcely less unnecessary were the directions she gave as
to the conduct of Betty, who received them all in erect submission, with
her hands under her apron. She ought to have been a young girl instead
of an elderly woman, if there was any propriety in the way her mistress
spoke to her. It proved at least her own belief in the description she
had given of her to Miss Lammie.

'Noo, Betty, ye maun be dooce. An' dinna stan' at the door i' the
gloamin'. An' dinna stan' claikin' an' jawin' wi' the ither lasses whan
ye gang to the wall for watter. An' whan ye gang intil a chop, dinna
hae them sayin' ahint yer back, as sune's yer oot again, "She's her ain
mistress by way o'," or sic like. An' min' ye hae worship wi' yersel',
whan I'm nae here to hae 't wi' ye. Ye can come benn to the parlour
gin ye like. An' there's my muckle Testament. And dinna gie the lads a'
thing they want. Gie them plenty to ait, but no ower muckle. Fowk suld
aye lea' aff wi' an eppiteet.'

Mr. Lammie brought his gig at last, and took grannie away to Bodyfauld.
When the boys returned from school at the dinner-hour, it was to exult
in a freedom which Robert had never imagined before. But even he could
not know what a relief it was to Shargar to eat without the awfully calm
eyes of Mrs. Falconer watching, as it seemed to him, the progress of
every mouthful down that capacious throat of his. The old lady would
have been shocked to learn how the imagination of the ill-mothered lad
interpreted her care over him, but she would not have been surprised to
know that the two were merry in her absence. She knew that, in some of
her own moods, it would be a relief to think that that awful eye of
God was not upon her. But she little thought that even in the lawless
proceedings about to follow, her Robert, who now felt such a relief in
her absence, would be walking straight on, though blindly, towards a
sunrise of faith, in which he would know that for the eye of his God
to turn away from him for one moment would be the horror of the outer
darkness.

Merriment, however, was not in Robert's thoughts,