"My dear aunt! you should have been a telegraph clerk. Well. Wrote for a machine to Carbost. Came along. Place shut up. Rick Halmar fishing sea pool. Saw signals of distress. Piloted 'em to harbour. Found Kirsty stacking peats. Lit the fire. Put on the kettle. Came home to tell his aunt. That is all, except that the factor is away to the Alan market and Kirsty has no English to speak of." "They have servants with them of course?" "A French maid. She is more solid than she looks. You see I had to help her out of the machine. She hadn't recovered the boat. They have been visiting about, and Mr. Wilson's man got left behind at Inverness, looking for lost luggage. Wired to say he would come on by the afternoon boat. Ha! ha! good joke, isn't it? Afternoon boat to Roederay. Now then, jump aboard! a penny all the way." Miss Willina's sympathetic soul saw no cause for mirth in the vision conjured up by her housewifely imagination. She put on the deer-stalker cap lying on the step beside her. It was a signal for action, since, within the home precincts, she dispensed with any head covering save the thick masses of dark hair, which were still her greatest pride. "I'll go over. Kirsty is an idiot, at best. She was six whole months learning the 'Happy Land' at Sunday-school. "Besides it's not far--then your uncle's official position." "Skip, please!" interrupted Rick, laughing. "You don't want excuses for being a trump. Come along." His aunt's blue eyes flashed and sparkled. "Oh! my dear! was she so pretty as all that? You won't be wanted! her husband is there, of course." "Aye! and her cousin, I think. At least, she called him Eustace." "Two of them! Then preserve us from a third man. Go you and fish like a Christian." "Leaving you to roam the moors alone, when I may be appointed to a ship tomorrow and not see you again for--don't laugh in that rude way, Aunt Will! Look here! Let's compromise. I'll go so far and fish Loch-na-buie till you return."