at has been my
housekeeper, as ye ken, for twenty year. But gin I do mak' up my mind to
that, it'll be a heartbreak that I didna do it twenty year since. It wad
hae saved expense."

"'Deed, I'm nane so sure o' that," said the goodwife, listening with one
ear cocked to the muffled laughter in the boys' sleeping-room.

"Thae loons are no' asleep yet," said she, lifting an old flat-heeled
slipper and disappearing.

There was a sharp _slap-slapping_ for a minute, mixed with cries of "Oh,
mither, it was Alec!" "No, mither, it was Rob!"

Mary appeared at the door presently, breathing as she did when she had
half done with the kirning. She set the slipper in the corner to be
ready to her hand in case of further need.

"Na, na, Ayrshireman," she said; "it's maybe time aneuch as it is for
you to marry Bell Mulwhulter. It's sma' savin' o' expense to bring up a
rachle o' bairns."

"Dod, woman, I never thocht a' that," said Tammock. "It's maybe as weel
as it is."

"Ay, better a deal. Let weel alane," said the mistress.

"I doot I'll hae to do that ony way noo," said Tammock.

"But what said Tibby o' the Hilltap to ye, Tammock, that ye gied up
thochts o' her sae sudden-like?"

"Na, I can tell that to naebody," he said at last.

"Hoots, haivers!" said the wife, who wanted very much to know. "Ye ken
that it'll gang nae farder."

"Aweel," said Tammock, "I'll tell ye."

And this he had intended to do from the first, as we knew, and he knew
that we knew it. But the rules of the game had to be observed. There was
something of a woman's round-the-corner ways about Tammock all his days,
and that was the way he got on so well with them as a general
rule--though Tibby o' the Hilltap had given him the go-by, as we were
presently to hear.

"The way o't was this," began Tammock, putting a red doit of peat into
the bowl of his pipe and squinting down at it with one eye shut to see
that it glowed. "I had been payin' my respects to Tibby up at the
Hilltap off and on for a year or twa--"

"Maistly on," said my wife. Tammock paid no attention.

"Tibby didna appear to mislike it to ony extent. She was fond o' caa'in'
the crack, an' I was wullin' that she should miscaa' me as muckle as she
likit--for I'm no' yin o' your crouse, conceity young chaps to be fleyed
awa' wi' a gibe frae a lassie."

"Ye never war that a' the days o' ye, Tammock!" said the mistress.

"Ay, ye are beginnin' to mind noo, mistress," said Tammas dryly. "Weel