The maid took her water-stoups and went up to the Cross Well, where women were busy at that hour of the day plying for the water of Bealloch-an-uarain, that bubbles up deep in the heart of the hills, and brings the coolness and refreshment of the shady wood into the burgh street in the most intense days of summer warmth. She filled her stoups composedly, set them down and gossiped, upset them as by accident, and waited patiently her turn to fill them anew. Thus by twenty minutes’ skilful loitering she secured from the baxter’s daughter the news that there was a supper at the Sheriff’s that very night, and that very large tarts were at the firing in the baxter’s oven. “Oh, indeed!” cried Miss Mary, when her emissary brought to her those tidings. “Then it seems the Campbells of Keil are not good enough company for Sheriff Maclachlan’s supper parties! My brother the Cornal, and my brother the Major-General, would have their own idea about that if so small a trifle as Madam’s tart supper and green tea was worth their notice or annoyance.” She was visibly disturbed, yet put on a certain air of indifference that scarcely deceived even Peggy. The worst of it was there was no one with whom she could share her annoyance, for, if the Paymaster had no sympathy, the other two brothers were unapproachable. Gilian found her in a little rain of tears. She started with shame at his discovery, and set herself to a noisy handling of dinner dishes that by this time he knew well enough were not in her daily office of industry. And she said never a word--she that never heard his foot upon the stair without a smile of pleasure, or saw his face at the door without a mother’s challenge to his appetite. “What is wrong, aunty?” he said in the Gaelic, using the term it had been agreed would best suit the new relationship. “Just nothing at all, my dear,” she said without looking round. “What would be wrong?” “But you are crying,” protested Gilian, alarmed lest he in some way should have been the cause of her distress. “Am I?” said Miss Mary. “And if I am, it is just for a silly thing only a woman would mind, a slight from people not worth heeding.” And then she told, still shamefacedly, her story. Gilian was amazed. “I did not think you cared for suppers and teas,” he said. “The last time you went to the Sheriffs you said you would far sooner be at home, and--”