m the table at the pursuing
unseen.

The jug struck the yellow face of the clock, and the glass jangled on
the floor.

Mrs. Gourlay raised her arms, like a gaunt sibyl, and spoke to her
Maker, quietly, as if He were a man before her in the room. "Ruin and
murder," she said slowly, "and madness; and death at my nipple like a
child! When will Ye be satisfied?"

Drucken Wabster's wife spread the news, of course, and that night it
went humming through the town that young Gourlay had the horrors, and
was throwing tumblers at his mother!

"Puir body!" said the baker, in the long-drawn tones of an infinite
compassion--"puir body!"

"Ay," said Toddle dryly, "he'll be wanting to put an end to _her_ next,
after killing his faither."

"Killing his faither?" said the baker, with a quick look. "What do you
mean?"

"Mean? Ou, I just mean what the doctor says! Gourlay was that mad at the
drucken young swine that he got the 'plexies, fell aff the ladder, and
felled himsell deid! That's what I mean, no less!" said Toddle, nettled
at the sharp question.

"Ay, man! That accounts for't," said Tam Wylie. "It did seem queer
Gourlay's dying the verra nicht the prodigal cam hame. He was a heavy
man too; he would come down with an infernal thud. It seems uncanny,
though, it seems uncanny."

"Strange!" murmured another; and they looked at each other in silent
wonder.

"But will this be true, think ye?" said Brodie--"about the horrors, I
mean. _Did_ he throw the tumbler at his mother?"

"Lord, it's true!" said Sandy Toddle. "I gaed into the kitchen on
purpose to make sure o' the matter with my own eyes. I let on I wanted
to borrow auld Gourlay's keyhole saw. I can tell ye he had a' his
orders--his tool-chest's the finest I ever saw in my life! I mean to bid
for some o' yon when the rowp comes. Weel, as I was saying, I let on I
wanted the wee saw, and went into the kitchen one end's errand. The
tumbler (Johnny Coe says it was a bottle, however; but I'm no avised o'
that--I speired Webster's wife, and I think my details are correct)--the
tumbler went flying past his mother, and smashed the face o' the
eight-day. It happened about the mid-hour o' the day. The clock had
stoppit, I observed, at three and a half minutes to the twelve."

"Hi!" cried the Deacon, "it'th a pity auld Gourlay wathna alive thith
day!"

"Faith, ay," cried Wylie. "_He_ would have sorted him; _he_ would have
trimmed the young ruffian!"

"No doubt," said the