the lodge for the keys, saying,
optimistically, that a sexton might unwittingly have locked Bobby in.
Young men with lanterns went through the courts of the tenements, around
the Grassmarket, and under the arches of the bridge. Laddies dropped
from the wall and hunted over Heriot's Hospital grounds to Lauriston
market. Tammy, poignantly conscious of being of no practical use, sat
on Auld Jock's grave, firm in the conviction that Bobby would return to
that spot his ainsel' And Ailie, being only a maid, whose portion it
was to wait and weep, lay across the window-sill, on the pediment of the
tomb, a limp little figure of woe.

Mr. Traill's heart was full of misgiving. Nothing but death or stone
walls could keep that little creature from this beloved grave. But, in
thinking of stone walls, he never once thought of the Castle. Away over
to the east, in Broughton market, when the garrison marched away and at
Lauriston when they returned, Mr. Traill did not know that the soldiers
had been out of the city. Busy in the lodge Mistress Jeanie had not seen
them go by the kirkyard, and no one else, except Mr. Brown, knew the
fascination that military uniforms, marching and music had for wee
Bobby. A fog began to drift in from the sea. Suddenly the grass was
sheeted and the tombs blurred. A curtain of gauze seemed to be hung
before the lighted tenements. The Castle head vanished, and the sounds
of the drum and bugle of the tattoo came down muffled, as if through
layers of wool. The lights of the bull's-eyes were ruddy discs that cast
no rays. Then these were smeared out to phosphorescent glows, like the
"spunkies" that everybody in Scotland knew came out to dance in old
kirkyards.

It was no' canny. In the smother of the fog some of the little boys were
lost, and cried out. Mr. Traill got them up to the gate and sent them
home in bands, under the escort of the students. Mistress Jeanie was out
by the wicket. Mr. Brown was asleep, and she "couldna thole it to
sit there snug." When a fog-horn moaned from the Firth she broke into
sobbing. Mr. Traill comforted her as best he could by telling her a
dozen plans for the morning. By feeling along the wall he got her to the
lodge, and himself up to his cozy dining-rooms.

For the first time since Queen Mary the gate of the historic garden of
the Greyfriars was left on the latch. And it was so that a little dog,
coming home in the night might not be shut out.

XI.

It was more th