the usual time.

And the master and Truffey did go down to the sea together. The master
borrowed a gig and hired a horse and driver; and they sat all three in
the space meant for two, and their boxes went by the carrier. To happy
Truffey a lame leg or two was not to be compared with the exultant
glory of that day. Was he not the master's friend henceforth? And was
he not riding in a gig--bliss supreme? And was not the harvest around
them, the blue tent of the sun over their heads, and the sea somewhere
before them? Truffey was prouder than Mr Malison could have been if,
instead of the result of that disastrous Sunday, he had been judged to
surpass Mr Turnbull in pulpit gifts, as he did in scholastic
acquirements. And if there be as much joy in the universe, what matter
how it be divided!--whether the master be raised from the desk to the
pulpit, or Truffey have a ride in a gig!

About this time Tibbie, sitting too late one evening upon the grass,
caught a bad cold and cough, and was for a fortnight confined to bed.
Within two days Annie became her constant companion--that is, from the
moment _the play_ commenced.

"I tell't ye I wad hae the licht afore lang," she said the first time
Annie came to her.

"Hoots, Tibbie! It's only an ill caud an' a host," said Annie, who from
being so much with her and Thomas had caught the modes of an elderly
woman. "Ye maunna be doonhertit."

"Doonhertit! The lassie's haverin'! Wha daured to say that I was
doonhertit within sicht o' the New Jerusalem? Order yer words better,
lassie, or else haud yer tongue."

"I beg yer pardon, Tibbie. It was ill-considered. But ye see hooever
willin' ye may be to gang, we're nane sae willin' to lat gang the grip
o' ye."

"Ye'll be a hantle better withoot me, lass. Oh, my heid! And the host's
jist like to rive me in bits, as the prophets rave their claes whan the
fowk contred them ower sair to bide. Aweel! This body's nothing but a
wheen claes to my sowl; and no verra weel made either, for the holes
for my een war forgotten i' the makin'.--I'm bit jokin', lassie; for it
was the Lord's han' that made and mismade my claes; and I'm weel
willin' to wear them as lang's he likes. Jist mak a drappy o' stoorum
to me. Maybe it'll ile my thrapple a bit. I winna be lang ahin Eppie
Shawn."

That was the woman who had occupied the other end of the cottage and
had died in the spring.

So Annie waited on Tibbie day and night. And that year, for the first