el' for forgettin' to mail that
letter. 'I promised him I would,' he said, 'but ye see, I have na'
been wearin' my best coat since he left, an' that's why. We gave him a
banket,' he says, 'an' I wore my best coat to the banket, an' he gave
me this an' told me to mail it after he was well away,' an' he says,
'I knew I ought not to put it in this coat pocket, for I'd forget
it,'--an' so he ran on; but it was no so good a coat, for the lining
was a' torn an' it was gray wi' dust, for I took it an' brushed it an'
mended it mysel' before I left Paris."

Again Jean paused, and taking out her neatly folded handkerchief wiped
away the falling tears, and sipped a moment at her tea in silence.

"Tak' ye a bit o' the scones, Jean. Ye'll no help matters by goin'
wi'oot eatin'. If the lad's done a shamefu' like thing, ye'll no help
him by greetin'. He maun fall. Ye've done yer best I doot, although
mistakenly to try to keep it fra me."

"He was sae bonny, Ellen, and that like his mither 'twould melt the
hairt oot o' ye to look on him."

"Ha'e ye no mair to tell me? Surely it never took ye these ten days to
find oot what ye ha'e tell't."

"The man was a kind sort o' a body, an' he took me oot to eat wi' him
at a cafy, an' he paid it himsel', but I'm thinkin' his purse was sair
empty whan he got through wi' it. I could na' help it. Men are vera
masterfu' bodies. I made it up to him though, for I bided a day or twa
at the hotel, an' went to the room,--the pentin' room whaur I found
him--there was whaur he stayed, for he was keepin' things as they
were, he said, for the one who was to come into they things--Robert
Kater had left there--ye'll find oot aboot them whan ye read the
letter--an' I made it as clean as ye'r han' before I left him. He made
a dour face whan he came in an' found me at it, but I'm thinkin' he
came to like it after a', for I heard him whustlin' to himsel' as I
went down the stair after tellin' him good-by.

"Gin ye had seen the dirt I took oot o' that room, Ellen, ye would a'
held up ye'r two han's in horror. There were crusts an' bones behind
the pictures standin' against the wa' that the rats an' mice had been
gnawin' there, an' there were bottles on a shelf, old an' empty an'
covered wi' cobwebs an' dust, an' the floor was so thick wi' dirt it
had to be scrapit, an' what wi' old papers an' rags I had a great
basket full taken awa--let be a bundle o' shirts that needed mendin'.
I took the shirts to the hote