‘I had coft her a bonny cairriage, wi’ as fine a pair as ever ye saw, Kirsty, as I daur say yer father has telled ye. And they warna lost upon her, for she had aye a gleg e’e for a horse. Ye min’ yon powny?--And up til yesterday, a’ gaed weel, till I was thinkin I cud trust her onygait. But i’ the efternune, as she was oot for an airin, ane o’ the horses cuist a shue, and thinkin naething o’ the risk til a human sowl, but only o’ the risk til the puir horse, the fule fallow stoppit at a smithy nae farrer nor the neist door frae a public, and tuik the horse intil the smithy, lea’in the smith’s lad at the heid o’ the ither horse. Sae what suld my leddy but oot upo’ the side _frae_ the smithy, and awa roon the back o’ the cairriage to the public, and in! Whether she took onything there I dinna ken, but she maun hae broucht a bottle hame wi her, for this mornin she was fou--fou as e’er ye saw man in market!’ He broke down, and wept like a child. ‘And what did ye du?’ asked Kirsty. ‘I said naething. I jist gaed to the coachman and gart him put his horses tu, and tak his denner wi’ him, and m’unt the box, and drive straucht awa til Aberdeen, and lea’ the carriage whaur I boucht it, and du siclike wi’ the horses, and come hame by the co’ch.’ As he ended the sad tale, he glanced up at Kirsty, and saw her regarding him with a look such as he had never seen, imagined, or dreamed of before. It lasted but a moment; her eyes dropt, and she went on with the knitting which, as in the old days, she had brought with her. ‘Noo, Kirsty, what am I to du neist?’ he said. ‘Hae ye naething i’ yer ain min’?’ she asked. ‘Naething.’ ‘Weel, we’ll awa hame!’ she returned, rising. ‘Maybe, as we gang, we’ll get licht!’ They walked in silence. Now and then Francis would look up in Kirsty’s face, to see if anything was coming, but saw only that she was sunk in thought: he would not hurry her, and said not a word. He knew she would speak the moment she had what she thought worth saying.