anding behind him, waiting, with white face
and parted lips, for Kenny's answer.

"Whisht!" said Kenny, pointing into the kitchen behind. Yankee looked
and saw Bella Peter and her father entering. But Ranald was determined
to know Kenny's opinion.

"Mr. Campbell," he whispered, eagerly, and forgetting the respect due to
an elder, he grasped Kenny's arm, "do you think with them?"

"That I do not," said Kenny, emphatically, and Yankee, at that word,
struck his hand into Kenny's palm with a loud smack.

"I knew blamed well you were not any such dumb fool," he said,
softening his speech in deference to Kenny's office and the surrounding
circumstances. So saying, he went away to the stable, and when Ranald
and his uncle, Macdonald Bhain, followed a little later to put up Peter
McGregor's team, they heard Yankee inside, swearing with a fluency and
vigor quite unusual with him.

"Whisht, man!" said Macdonald Bhain, sternly. "This is no place or time
to be using such language. What is the matter with you, anyway?"

But Macdonald could get no satisfaction out of him, and he said to his
nephew, "What is it, Ranald?"

"It is the elders, Peter McRae and Straight Rory," said Ranald,
sullenly. "They were saying that Mack was--that Mack was--"

"Look here, boss," interrupted Yankee, "I ain't well up in Scriptures,
and don't know much about these things, and them elders do, and they
say--some of them, anyway--are sending Mack to hell. Now, I guess you're
just as well up as they are in this business, and I want your solemn
opinion." Yankee's face was pale, and his eyes were glaring like a wild
beast's. "What I say is," he went on, "if a feller like Mack goes to
hell, then there ain't any. At least none to scare me. Where Mack is
will be good enough for me. What do you say, boss?"

"Be quiet, man," said Macdonald Bhain, gravely, but kindly. "Do you not
know you are near to blasphemy there? But I forgive you for the sore
heart you have; and about poor Mack yonder, no one will be able to say
for certain. I am a poor sinner, and the only claim I have to God's
mercy is the claim of a poor sinner. But I will dare to say that I have
hope in the Lord for myself, and I will say that I have a great deal
more for Mack."

"I guess that settles it all right, then," said Yankee, drawing a big
breath of content and biting off a huge chew from his plug. "But what
the blank blank," he went on, savagely, "do these fellers mean, stirring
up a