"Sorry for it. I suppose you'll be burrowing under my cottage and burying me one of these days before my time?" "Don't be alarmed, sir." "I'm not," growled Uncle Luke. "Uncle is cross, because he is catching more fish than he wants this morning," said Louise quietly. "Hear that, Maddy, my dear?" said the old man, sharply. "Here's a problem for you:--If my niece's tongue is as keen-edged as that before she is twenty, what will it be at forty?" The girl addressed laughed and shook her head. "Any one would think it would be a warning to any sensible man to keep his distance." "Uncle! Pray!" whispered the niece, looking troubled; but the old man only chuckled and hooked another fish. "Going to make a fortune out of the old mine, Leslie!" he said. "Fortune? No, sir. A fair income, I hope." "Which with prudence and economy--Scottish prudence and economy"--he added, meaningly, "would keep you when you got to be an old man like me. Bah!" He snatched out his line and gave an impatient stamp with his foot. "What is the matter, uncle?" "What's the matter? It was bad enough before. Look there!" Volume 1, Chapter II. ELEMENTS OF A WHOLE. Madelaine Van Heldre had seen the object of Uncle Luke's vexation before he called attention to it; and at the first glance her eyes had lit up with pleasure, but only to give place to an anxious, troubled look, and faint lines came across her brow. "Why, it is only Harry with his friend," said Louise quietly. "Yes: flopping and splashing about in the boat. There will not be a fish left when they've done." "I'll tell them to land at the lower stairs," said Louise eagerly. "No; let 'em come and do their worst," said the old man, with quite a snarl. "Why doesn't Harry row, instead of letting that miserable cockney fool about with an oar?" "Miserable cockney!" said Duncan Leslie to himself; and his face, which had been overcast, brightened a little as he scanned the boat coming from the harbour. "Mr Pradelle likes exercise," said Louise quietly. Duncan's face grew dull again. "Then I wish he would take it in London," said the old man, "jumping over his desk or using his pen, and not come here." The water glistened and sparkled with the vigorous strokes given by the two young men who propelled the boat, and quickly after there was a grating noise as the bows ground against the rocks of the point and a young man in white flannels leaped ashore, while his companion after awkwardly laying in his oar followed the example, balancing himself as he stepped on to the gunwale, and then, after the fashion of a timid horse at a gutter, making a tremendous bound on to the rocks. As he did this his companion made a quick leap back into the bows to seize the chain, when he had to put out an oar once more and paddle close up to the rock, the boat having been sent adrift by the force of the other's leap.