to the widow of Tom Hercus, to say nothing of Mrs.
Rosson, whose rent had fallen so far in arrear that she had been
threatened with an eviction from her cottage, and was only saved by
this timely assistance.

Chapter XXVI. A Subterranean Adventure.

It was little that I saw of my old school companions now that I had
become a farm worker and spent my days in the fields. Sometimes,
indeed, when I was tending my nibbling flock on the hillside, or
driving them over to the distant pasture land by the margin of the
loch of Harray, where the grass grew sweetest, I would chance to
see Thora Kinlay on her way from Crua Breck to Stromness, and
occasionally she would come to Lyndardy to see my sister Jessie.
These were the summer days; but when the harvest season came round,
and our crop of oats had to be gathered in, and, later still, our
turnips stored away for the winter, I was then always busy with my
work, and very seldom had opportunity of speaking with Thora, or of
even seeing her from a distance.

And yet I had often a wish to be near her, and to show her what
kindness or sympathy a lad can show to a girl whom he believes to
have but little happiness in life. For the treatment that Thora
received at her home was becoming day by day more severe.

With Tom she of course had no pursuits in common; he treated her
with harshness, and as much as possible she avoided him. Even Mrs.
Kinlay seemed to regard her with very scant affection, and as the
girl grew in years her position at the farm became that of a
servant rather than of a daughter. As for Carver Kinlay himself, he
seldom spoke a gentle word to body or beast, and Thora had no
exception from his severity. His continued ill treatment of her
was, however, the more difficult to endure, since from simple abuse
it often extended to actual brutality. She could never understand
why her father and mother were so unkind to her, and to hear a few
words of sympathy was always comforting.

One day late in the autumn I was tending our sheep on the banks
above the cliffs of Gaulton, lying on the soft green turf with my
hands under my chin, looking dreamily across the sea towards the
blue outline of hills on the Scotch coast. I had just finished
reading the last pages of Robinson Crusoe, and the book had fallen
from my hand. Like my sheep, I was languid with the heat of the
noonday sun, and the sight of the ships and the whirling seagulls
was refreshing to me. The sound of