"Ye'll be thinkin' lang (ennuy�), Mr Forbes, at haein' to bide i' the hoose wi' that blackamoor ee o' yours. Hoo dinna ye gang up the stair to Mr Cupples, and hae a lauch wi' him?" "I didna ken ye had onybody up the stair. Wha's Mr Cupples?" "Weel, he kens that best himsel! But he's a gey queer ane. He's a terrible scholar though, fowk says--gran' at the Greek, and rael bonny on the mathewmawtics. Only ye maunna be fleyt (frightened) at him." "I'm easy fleyt," said Alec, with a laugh. "But I wad like to see him." "Gang up, than, and chap at the garret door upo' yer left han'." "But what reason am I to gie him for disturbin' him?" asked Alec. "Ow nane ava. Jist tak' a moufu' o' Greek wi' ye to speir the richt meanin' o', gin ye maun hae a rizzon." "That will do just first-rate," said Alec; "for here I have been puzzling over a sentence for the last half hour with nobody but this dim-sighted ghost of a Schrevelius to help me out with it. I'll go directly. But I look such a blackguard with this game eye!" The landlady laughed. "You'll sune forget that whan ye see Mr Cupples." To the dismay of his nurse, Alec pulled the bandage off his eye, and amidst her expostulations caught up his book, and rushing away, bounded up the garret stairs, which ascended outside the door of the _flat_. At the top, he found himself under the bare roof, with only boards and slates between him and the clouds. The landing was lighted by a skylight, across which diligent and undisturbed spiders had woven their webs for years. He stood for a moment or two, puzzled as to which door he ought to assail, for all the doors about looked like closet-doors, leading into dingy recesses. At last, with the aid of his nose, he made up his mind, and knocked. "Come in," cried a voice of peculiar tone. It reminded Alec of something he could not at all identify, which was not wonderful, seeing it was of itself, heard once before, that it reminded him. It was the same voice which, as he walked to the debate, the first night, had warned him not to look at rainbows. He opened the door and entered. "What do you want?" said the voice, its source almost invisible in the thick fumes of genuine pigtail, through which it sent cross odours of as genuine Glenlivat. "I want you to help me with a bit of Homer, if you please, Mr Cupples-�I'm not up to Homer yet." "Do ye think I hae naething ither to do than to grin' the grandur o' an auld haythen into spunemate for a young sinner like you?" "Ye dinna ken what I'm like, Mr Cupples," returned Alec, remembering his landlady's injunction not to be afraid of him. "Come athort the reek, and lat's luik at ye."