other musical
instrument ancient and modern, the drawing-room was large enough to have
driven a coach-and-four around.

The bedrooms above were many of them so lofty that in the dead, dull
winter two great fires in each could hardly keep them warm.

The room in which the girls sat was the tartan boudoir. The walls were
draped with clan tartans, and eke the lounges and chairs; while the
heads of many a royal stag adorned the walls, amidst tastefully
displayed claymores, spears, shields, and dirks, and pistols.

"Just two years, Gerty. How quickly the time has fled!"

"Just two years, Flora. Strange that I should have been thinking about
Jack this very moment. But then you were playing one of Jack's favourite
airs, you know."

Flora got up from her seat at the harp. A tall and graceful girl she
was, with a wealth of auburn hair, and blue dreamy eyes, and eyelashes
that swept her sun-tinted cheeks when she looked downwards.

She got up from her seat, and went and knelt beside the couch on which
Gerty was lounging with a book.

"Why strange, sister?" she asked, taking Gerty's hand.

Gerty was _petite_, blonde, bewitching--so many a young man said, and
many a rough old squire as well. She was no baby in face, however.
Although of the purest type of Saxon beauty--without the square chin
that so disfigures many an otherwise lovely English face--there was fire
and character in every lineament of Gerty Keane's countenance.

She answered Flora calmly, candidly, quietly--I am almost inclined to
say, in a business way that reminded one of her father.

"Dear Flo," she said--and her eyes as she spoke had a sad and far-away
look in them--"it would be unmaidenly in me to say how much I should
like to be your sister in reality. It may not be strange for me to
think of Jack; we have liked each other, almost loved each other, since
childhood."

"Almost?" said Flora.

"Listen, Flo. I _may_ love Jack, but there is one other I love even
more."

"Sir Digby, Gerty?"

"No, dear Flo, but my father. I love him more because he has few
friends, and because others do not love him. I would do anything for
father."

"You would even marry Sir Digby?"

"Perhaps."

"O Gerty! poor Jack will break his heart."

She buried her face in the pillow for a few moments. She was struggling
with the grief that bid fair to choke her. When she looked up again
there was nothing but softness in Gerty's face, and tears were coursing
down her chee