"I will not be bullied into doing what I know to be unwise, Jessy. I am considering the whole life of my children, not a few weeks or months of youth's illusory dreams and temptations. Donald, as a man, will have the privilege of making a choice; as for Marion, I shall insist on her accepting a marriage which will shelter her as far as possible from all the ills of life." "Do you mean that you will make her marry that lying, sneaking, tale-telling cub, Allan Reid?" "Certainly. His faults grew out of his jealousy of Donald's beauty and cleverness. He confessed his fault to me and I forgave him. All stands as it stood before that disagreeable evening. He said Donald was very scornful and provoking. I can believe it." "I hope he was." Then she laughed, and added, with an air of satisfaction: "Donald has a way of his own. He can be very civil, and very unbearable. I have seen him----," and she laughed again at the memory. "I am going to my room, Jessy. I have said all I have to say on these subjects." "Will you have some bread and milk first?" "No. I had an excellent dinner. It was late also. You have made me wretched, Jessy." "I am sorry, Ian. But, as it concerns the children, we are pulling at opposite ends of the rope." "They are _my_ children. You will kindly remember that fact, Mrs. Caird." He spoke with a haughty determination and left her without even his usual perfunctory "good night." She was troubled by his somewhat unusual show of temper, and the noble repose of the night had no note of comfort for her. The silence of the far-receding mountains, the murmur of the streams, the air of lonely pastoral melancholy, with a light like dreamland lying over all, did not help her wounded feelings. The Scot does not ask Nature for comfort in any heart sorrow; there is the Book, and the God of his Fathers. But Jessy Caird had not yet arrived at the point where she felt her exigencies beyond her own direction. In a few minutes she saw Dr. Macrae light his room, and through its open window there came the odor of a fine cigar. "After the manner of men," she muttered. "They don't permit a woman to smoke--if she is worried or ill-tempered--it is not ladylike. And I'm wondering what improves its manners so as to make it gentleman-like. Men are selfish creatures, all of them, not one good, no, not one!"