"No indeed!" he answered. "I seem at this very hour to have just found myself and my senses." "What is all the fuss about, Ian?" asked Rahal. "England has gone to war at the long last with the cruel, crafty black Bear of the North." "Well then, it is full time she did so, there are none will say different." "And," continued Ian, "there is a ship now in harbour carrying enlisting officers--you may see her; she is to call at the Orkney and Shetland Islands for recruits for the navy, and Great Scot! she will get them! All she wants! She could take every man out of Kirkwall!" "The Mayor and Captain Ragnor will not permit her to do so. She will have to leave men to manage the fishing," said Rahal. "I thought the women could do that," said Ian. "You do not know what you are talking about. It takes two or three men to lift a net full of fish out of the water, and they are about done up if they manage it. Come in and get your breakfast. If your news be true, there is no saying when Ragnor will get home. He will have some reasoning with his men to do, he cannot spare many of them." "I have a good idea," said Mistress Brodie. "I will give a dance on Friday night for the enlisting officers, and we will invite all the presentable young men, and all the prettiest girls, to meet them." "But you will be too late on Friday. The cutter and her crew will leave Thursday morning early," said Ian. "Then say Wednesday night." "That might do. I could tell the men freshly enlisted to wear a white ribbon in their coats----" "No, no, no!" cried Rahal. "What are you saying, Ian? A white favour is a Stuart favour. You would set the men fighting in the very dance room. There is no excuse in the Orkneys for a Stuart memory." "I was not thinking of the Stuarts. Have they not done bothering yet?" "In the Scotch heart the Stuart lives forever," said Rahal, with a sigh. But the dance was decided on and some preparations made for it as soon as breakfast was over. Ian was enthusiastic on the matter and Thora caught his enthusiasm very readily, and before night, all Kirkwall was preparing to feast and rejoice because England was going to make the great Northern Bear--"the Bear that walks like a man"--stay in the North where he belonged. CHAPTER V SUNNA AND THORA Love, the old, old troubler of the world. Love has reasons, of which reason knows nothing. Alas, how easily things go wrong! A sigh too much, or a kiss too long, And there follows a mist and a weeping rain And life is never the same again. No sooner was Mrs. Brodie's intention known, than all her friends were eager to help her. There was truly but little time between Monday morning and Wednesday night; but many hands make light work, and old and young offered their services in arranging for what it pleased all to consider as a kind of national thanksgiving.