“I didn’t run all the way, but when I got out of breath I had to walk. Ah, but I wanted wings.” “Do you think we’ve changed her, marm?” asked Dod of Mrs. Kennedy. “She is taller and not so serious.” “Who could be serious at such a time?” laughed Agnes. “And she has a way with her that is new to me.” “It’s maybe offen Polly O’Neill she has that,” said Dod, wagging his head. Agnes flushed up. She did not like to be compared to Polly, much as she loved the dear creature, and it was the second time that day that the comparison had been made. “I’ll be my old self now with my mother near me,” she said gravely. “I have run wild, I know, and Polly has not checked me. Polly has not your ways, mother, and sometimes I have been forgetting; but Polly is a good woman and has been like a sister to me.” “Your girl is a good, brave lass, and you’ve no cause to be ashamed of her,” Dod declared. “I could never be that, I well know,” Mrs. Kennedy returned quietly. Sometimes walking with Jock and Sandy, sometimes riding with Margret cuddled one side and Jessie the other, the baby on her lap, Agnes made the journey back to the M’Cleans’ gate, where Mrs. M’Clean, Jeanie, and David stood waiting for the party. “You’ll better be dropping some of your load here,” Mrs. M’Clean suggested. “Oh, no, no.” Agnes positively refused to consider this. “But where will you stow them all in your bit of a cabin?” “We’ll hang them up on pegs rather than leave one behind,” Agnes declared. “We’ll manage somehow.” But Mrs. M’Clean shook her head as they started off. “We’ve a deal of room, now Archie’s gone,” she said, “and where they’ll stow those five children, not to mention Margaret Kennedy hersel’, I don’t know.” But she did not know Polly and her resources. CHAPTER XII MOTHER Polly’s face beamed a welcome on the travellers. The fact that the little cabin contained but the living-room and the lean-to downstairs and the two little loft chambers above, did not disturb her in the least when the matter of accommodating five extra persons was to be considered. “Let me see,” she said meditatively, “the two biggest lads can sleep in one o’ the loft rooms, and Agnes can take Margret in with her; then the other two little ones an’ my youngest can have the trundle-bed, and the father an’ mother the big bed below, an’ Jimmy an’ mesel’ with the others can go to the barn.” “Turn you out! I’d like to see us,” said Agnes. “I can take both my sisters in with me, and the lads can go to the barn. They’re well off to have no worse place, and they’ll not mind it in the least.” And though Polly protested and brought Jimmy into the discussion, it was at last managed as Agnes had suggested.