Jeremy leaped upon the instrument, in three light, silent strides, like some graceful, dangerous animal. He swung it over his head with something like a cheer, and at once swept into a tide of melody. Elsie looked all about her. Nothing had been moved, save that on one of the sofas was the mark of muddy boots---Jeremy's for certain. For it was to that place he betook himself now. All the rest of the chamber bore the mark of Miss Orrin's careful hand, and her worst enemy did not deny that she was an excellent housekeeper. "Where is my grandfather?" cried Elsie, in a pause of the stormy music. Jeremy answered her by a simple cock of the thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the door of the weaving-room. "He went ben there a while syne to work a stent at your wedding quilt, my bonnie lamb! "Oh, I shall be the bridegroom. And ye shall be the bride!" With a sudden lift of hope, Elsie listened for the well-known "caa" of her grandfather's shuttle. What if only he were there! What if all the evil were quite untrue--the message that the hateful woman had brought on her way to school--was he not her own blood, the father of her mother? Surely he would save her! She moved toward the door with the instinct to call for help strong within her. But instantly Mad Jeremy, who had been reclining carelessly on the sofa, motioned her away. "Come nearer me," he commanded--"there, on the carpet by the fire, where Jeremy can see ye. Ah, it's a grand thing to bring hame a bonnie lass to her ain hoose--her hoose and mine!-- "I'se be the laird o't, And she'll be the leddy; She'll be the minnie o't, And I'se be the daddy!" Elsie made a dash for the windows, as if to leap out upon the lawn, but the movements of the maniac were far faster. In the wink of an eyelid he had laid aside his melodeon and caught her again by the wrist. "Na, na," he said, "the like o' that will never, never do! There's nae sense in that ava'! See!" And leading her to the window he showed her the bars which her grandfather had caused to be put up to guard his treasures. It was as difficult to get out of Deep Moat Grange as to get in. That was what it amounted to, and Elsie recognized it clearly and immediately. "My grandfather!" she moaned, half crying with pain and disappointment. "Where is he--I want to speak to my grandfather!" Jeremy made a mysterious sign to command silence, pointed again over his shoulder at the door of the weaving-room, and answered-- "He ben there. But Hobby was in nae guid temper the last time I spak' wi' him. It is better to let him come to a while. He aye does that at the weavin', when he is nettled at onything!" "But I do not hear the shuttle," objected Elsie. "How am I to know he is there--that you are speaking the truth?"