In miserable uncertainty she began to re-read the document. In the midst of it she went rigid. Her brother was coming through the shop, calling her. Her fingers fumbled at her bodice. Too late! In her panic her eye was caught by the morning’s paper lying on the floor at her side. She snatched it up, pushed the letter into the folds, and made pretence of reading. “What’s wrong wi’ ye?” said Corrie, entering. “I was just looking at the price of Zeniths,” she stammered. “Away and attend to the post office,” he returned. “I mun be in the shop this forenoon. . . . D’ye hear me?” “Aye.” To take the paper with her would be sheer madness, she reflected quickly; besides he was done with it. She would come back for it at the first opportunity. Letting it fall where she had found it, she got up and left the kitchen. He followed her, growling. * * * * * At half-past eleven, the morning delivery finished, Sam, as was his custom, came into the shop to purchase a paper. “There’s no’ one left,” said the boy. From the opposite counter, where he was serving a customer, Corrie called to the boy— “Ye’ll get one in the house.” It was not the first time he had sold his own paper to the postman. So presently the boy came back with the paper, and Sam, folding it up, put it in his pocket, and went home to see what was happening in the great world. CHAPTER IX FORTUNATELY for his stomach’s sake, at any rate, it was the weekly half-holiday, so that Mr. Corrie, having closed the shop at one, was free to relieve his sister in the post office and dispatch her to prepare, with all speed, something in the way of dinner. He was a little astonished at the eagerness with which she departed to do his bidding. A minute later she was back, looking as though she had seen a ghost. “John, where’s the paper?” “What paper?” “The morning paper. Quick!—what ha’ ye done wi’ it?” He turned from the counter with a grunt of impatience. “Get my dinner ready and never heed about the paper! If ye want to ken, Zeniths dropped six-and-threepence yesterday—no’ that it matters to us now. Away wi’ ye and hurry up.” “John, for the love o’ God, tell me where the paper is!” That startled him. “What the mischief’s wrong wi’ ye, woman?” he demanded, regarding her frowningly. “Sam, the postman, got the paper. There wasna another in the shop—” For a moment’s space she gazed at him as though he had said something too awful for belief. Then, with a wail, she threw up her hands. “It’s the beginning o’ the judgment!” “What d’ye mean? Are ye daft?” He seized her roughly by the arm. “Speak!” “The letter was inside the paper,” she moaned. “The letter! What letter?” “Hugh Carstairs’ letter about the shares. . . . I took it from the safe to read it. . . . When I heard ye coming to the kitchen I was feared, and I hid it in the paper. . . . I—I didna mean to betray ye, John, but—oh, dinna look at me like that!”