"_A cader va chi troppo in alto sale_," interrupted Father Macdonald, clambering down on his side. He was a small man with round childish face, possessed of that marvellously delicate yet healthy complexion which one sees in Sisters of Charity; in those, briefly, who take no care for beauty and lead a life of austerity and self-denial. A complexion which a society woman would have given her eyes to possess. "Hoot away wi' your gifts o' tongues," retorted the old lady, in mock indignation at the perennial jest of strange quotations. "Marjory, just take them ben and stop their mouths wi' cake and wine. And make them drink luck to the auld house that is to be graced wi' its master." "Ah, my dear Madam," said the incorrigible offender, ambling up the steps, and giving a sly glance at Marjory, "you agree with our friend Cicero, '_Nec, domo dominus sed domino domus honestanda est_.'" Mrs. Cameron treated the remark with silent contempt, and Marjory, leading the way into the morning room where Paul Macleod's portrait hung on the wall, looked back with a kind smile at the two old men who, never having owned chick or child of their own, treated her as a daughter. A sort of dream-daughter, dear yet far removed from the hard realities of every-day familiarity. "I'm so glad you were passing to-day, father," she said eagerly; "I found a little Neapolitan song among some old music here, and I want you to see if I sing it right." Mr. Wilson, seated in the armchair, his legs disposed elegantly, straightened his necktie, and made a remark to the effect that the Neapolitans were the most debased Christian population in Europe. And that despite the fact that they lived, as it were, under the very nose of the Pope. An attack which was the result of an ever-green jealousy in regard to the little Jesuit's superior knowledge. "Neapolitan! Ah! my dear young lady, the patois is almost beyond me. If it had been Roman!" The smooth childlike face grew almost wistful thinking of the days so long ago spent in the still seclusion of the Scotch college, or out in the noisy colour of the Roman streets; a quaint memory for the old man who for fifty years had never seen a town, whose very occupation was passing away from his life, as, one by one, the old adherents to the old faith still lingering among the mountain fastnesses, died and were buried by him. "Ah! you will manage," said Marjory, cheerfully. "It isn't as if you didn't know the subject, for it is sure to be all about love. Songs always are." So, while the cake and wine were coming in, she sate down to the piano and sang, guided by the two old men, of love; for Mr. Wilson, great on philology, had his views on the mutations of vowels and consonants, and stood beside the little priest beating time to the phrases with his gold eyeglasses. Mrs. Cameron found them so, and rallied them on their taste when there was good port-wine on the table.