using one of her favourite sayings.

"She wasna," answered Tammas. "Says she, 'Hae nae fear on that score,
Gavin; my father's fine willin' to spare me!'"

"An' that ended it?"

"Ay, that ended it."

"Did ye tak it doun in writin'?" asked Hendry.

"There was nae need," said Tammas, handing round his snuff-mull. "No,
I never touched paper. When I saw the thing was settled, I left them
to their coortin'. They're to tak a look at Snecky Hobart's auld hoose
the nicht. It's to let."

CHAPTER XVI

THE SON FROM LONDON

In the spring of the year there used to come to Thrums a painter from
nature whom Hendry spoke of as the drawer. He lodged with Jess in my
attic, and when the weavers met him they said, "Weel, drawer," and then
passed on, grinning. Tammas Haggart was the first to say this.

The drawer was held a poor man because he straggled about the country
looking for subjects for his draws, and Jess, as was her way, gave him
many comforts for which she would not charge. That, I daresay, was why
he painted for her a little portrait of Jamie. When the drawer came
back to Thrums he always found the painting in a frame in the room.
Here I must make a confession about Jess. She did not in her secret
mind think the portrait quite the thing, and as soon as the drawer
departed it was removed from the frame to make way for a calendar. The
deception was very innocent, Jess being anxious not to hurt the donor's
feelings.

To those who have the artist's eye, the picture, which hangs in my
school-house now, does not show a handsome lad, Jamie being short and
dapper, with straw-coloured hair, and a chin that ran away into his
neck. That is how I once regarded him, but I have little heart for
criticism of those I like, and, despite his madness for a season, of
which, alas, I shall have to tell, I am always Jamie's friend. Even to
hear any one disparaging the appearance of Jess's son is to me a pain.

All Jess's acquaintances knew that in the beginning of every month a
registered letter reached her from London. To her it was not a matter
to keep secret. She was proud that the help she and Hendry needed in
the gloaming of their lives should come from her beloved son, and the
neighbours esteemed Jamie because he was good to his mother. Jess had
more humour than any other woman I have known while Leeby was but
sparingly endowed; yet, as the month neared its close, it was the
daughter who put on the humorist,