nor I hae been. An auld wife's better nor nae
fiddle.'

He stooped, lifted the violin with his left hand, gave it to Robert,
rose, and made for the door. They helped him up the creaking stair, got
him half-undressed, and laid him in his bed. Robert put the violin on
the top of a press within sight of the sufferer, left him groaning, and
ran for the doctor. Having seen him set out for the patient's dwelling,
he ran home to his grandmother.

Now while Robert was absent, occasion had arisen to look for him:
unusual occurrence, a visitor had appeared, no less a person than Mr.
Innes, the school-master. Shargar had been banished in consequence
from the parlour, and had seated himself outside Robert's room, never
doubting that Robert was inside. Presently he heard the bell ring, and
then Betty came up the stair, and said Robert was wanted. Thereupon
Shargar knocked at the door, and as there was neither voice nor hearing,
opened it, and found, with a well-known horror, that he had been
watching an empty room. He made no haste to communicate the fact.
Robert might return in a moment, and his absence from the house not be
discovered. He sat down on the bedstead and waited. But Betty came up
again, and before Shargar could prevent her, walked into the room with
her candle in her hand. In vain did Shargar intreat her to go and say
that Robert was coming. Betty would not risk the danger of discovery in
connivance, and descended to open afresh the fountain of the old lady's
anxiety. She did not, however, betray her disquietude to Mr. Innes.

She had asked the school-master to visit her, in order that she might
consult him about Robert's future. Mr. Innes expressed a high opinion of
the boy's faculties and attainments, and strongly urged that he should
be sent to college. Mrs. Falconer inwardly shuddered at the temptations
to which this course would expose him; but he must leave home or be
apprentice to some trade. She would have chosen the latter, I believe,
but for religion towards the boy's parents, who would never have thought
of other than a profession for him. While the school-master was dwelling
on the argument that he was pretty sure to gain a good bursary, and she
would thus be relieved for four years, probably for ever, from further
expense on his account, Robert entered.

'Whaur hae ye been, Robert?' asked Mrs. Falconer.

'At Dooble Sanny's,' answered the boy.

'What hae ye been at there?'

'Helpin' him till 's be