"Well," said he, at length, "I am not quite sure, but I fancy if you wish to have those men removed, you would have to take proceedings under the Vagrant Act. I am not quite sure; I fancy that is so. But then, if you do that, you will be denounced by the Highland Land League, and by plenty of the newspapers—natural enough on the part of the newspapers, for they would know nothing of the circumstances." Käthchen thought that the outlaw and savage (as he had been described to her) talked very reasonably and intelligently; but Mary Stanley was quite as much perplexed as before. "I don’t want to bring the law to bear on anybody," she said. "I don’t want to injure anybody. Surely there are other ways. If I go to those men, and show them they have no right to be there, and pay them for the lobster-traps that were burned, and give them each a sum of money, surely they would go away home to their own island?" And then she added (for she wasn’t a fool), "Or might not that merely induce a lot more to come in their place?" "I am afraid it would," said he. But by this time the big steamer was slowing in to the pier. "Miss Stanley," said young Ross, "would you mind coming this way a little—to be out of the reach of the rope?" She politely thanked him, and moved her position; then he left her, making his way through the people; and the next she saw of him was that he was on the bridge, talking to the captain. There was a good deal of cargo—barrels, bales, and what not—to be landed; but only one passenger came ashore, a white-haired little woman, whose luggage consisted of an American-looking trunk and also the head and enormous horns of a Wapiti deer, the head swathed in canvas. The little dame was of a most pleasant appearance, with her silvery hair, her bright eyes, and a complexion unusually fresh and clear for one of her age; and she was smartly and neatly dressed, too; but when once she had come along the gangway, and passed through the crowd, hardly any further notice was taken of her, all attention being concentrated on what was going forward on board the steamer. The poor old woman seemed bewildered—and agitated; her hands were trembling; she was staring back in a curious way at the vessel she had just left. Mary (of course) went up to her. "Can I be of any assistance to you?" she said, in her gentle way. And then perhaps she would rather have drawn back; for she found that the old dame’s eyes were overflowing with tears. "That—is the young master?" the old woman asked, in tones of eager and yet subdued excitement—and she was still staring at the two figures on the bridge. "That is Mr. Ross of Heimra," Mary said, "who is talking to the captain." The silver-haired old dame clasped her trembling hands together.