ad reluctantly to admit that he was cut off from his
communications.

Merton, who was with him in the smoking-room, mentally absolved the
Highland housemaids. If they had not swept up the tiny glittering
metallic points on the carpet before, they had done so now. Only two or
three caught his eye.

Mr. Macrae, avid of news, accommodated himself in an arm-chair with
newspapers of two or three days old, from which he had already sucked the
heart by aid of his infernal machine. The Budes and Blake, with Miss
Macrae (an Anglican), had set off to walk to the Catholic chapel, some
four miles away, for crofting opinion was resolute against driving on the
Lord's Day. Merton, self-denying and resolved, did not accompany his
lady; he read a novel, wrote letters, and felt desolate. All was peace,
all breathed of the Sabbath calm.

'Very odd there's no call from the machine,' said Mr. Macrae anxiously.

'It is Sunday,' said Merton.

'Still, they might send us something.'

'They scarcely favoured us last Sunday,' said Merton.

'No, and now I think of it, not at all on the Sunday before,' said Mr.
Macrae. 'I dare say it is all right.'

'Would a thunder-storm further south derange it?' asked Merton, adding,
'There was a lot of summer lightning last night.'

'That might be it; these things have their tempers. But they are a great
comfort. I can't think how we ever did without them,' said Mr. Macrae,
as if these things were common in every cottage. 'Wonderful thing,
science!' he added, in an original way, and Merton, who privately
detested science, admitted that it was so.

'Shall we go to see the horses?' suggested Mr. Macrae, and they did go
and stare, as is usual on Sunday in the country, at the hind-quarters of
these noble animals. Merton strove to be as much interested as possible
in Mr. Macrae's stories of his fleet American trotters. But his heart
was otherwhere. 'They will soon be an extinct species,' said Mr. Macrae.
'The motor has come to stay.'

Merton was not feeling very well, he was afraid of a cigarette, Mr.
Macrae's conversation was not brilliant, and Merton still felt as if he
were under the wrath, so well deserved, of his hostess. She did not
usually go to the Catholic chapel; to be sure, in the conditions
prevailing at the Free Kirk place of worship, she had no alternative if
she would not abstain wholly from religious privileges. But Merton felt
sure that she had really gone to comfort and c