“She sees naething!” said Peter to himself. “I s’ awa’ to my wark!—Still I winna hae her laid aside afore I’m a wheen surer o’ what she is—leevin sowl or deid clod!” With a sad sense of vanished self-delusion, he rose and went out. As he passed through the kitchen, his wife followed him to the door. “Ye’ll see and sen’ a message to the vricht (_carpenter_) the day?” she whispered. “I’m no likly to forget!” he answered; “but there’s nae hurry, seein there’s no life concernt!” “Na, nane; the mair’s the pity!” she answered; and Peter knew, with a glad relief, that his wife was coming to herself from the terrible blow. She sent the cowboy to the Cormacks’ cottage, to tell Eppie to come to her. The old woman came, heard what details there were to the sad story, shook her head mournfully, and found nothing to say; but together they set about preparing the body for burial. That done, the mind of Mrs. Blatherwick was at ease, and she sat expecting the visit of the carpenter. But the carpenter did not come. On the Thursday morning the soutar came to inquire after his friends at Stanecross, and the gudewife gave him a message to Willie Wabster, the _vricht_, to see about the coffin. But the soutar, catching sight of the farmer in the yard, went and had a talk with him; and the result was that he took no message to the carpenter; and when Peter went in to his dinner, he still said there was no hurry: why should she be so anxious to heap earth over the dead? For still he saw, or fancied he saw, the same possible colour on Isy’s cheek—like the faintest sunset-red, or that in the heart of the palest blush-rose, which is either glow or pallor as you choose to think it. So the first week of Isy’s death passed, and still she lay in state, ready for the grave, but unburied. Not a few of the neighbours came to see her, and were admitted where she lay; and some of them warned Marion that, when the change came, it would come suddenly; but still Peter would not hear of her being buried “with that colour on her cheek!” And Marion had come to see, or to imagine with her husband that she saw the colour. So, each in turn, they kept watching her: who could tell but the Lord might be going to work a miracle for them, and was not in the meantime only trying them, to see how long their patience and hope would endure! The report spread through the neighbourhood, and reached Tiltowie, where it speedily pervaded street and lane:—“The lass at Stanecross, she’s lyin deid, and luikin as alive as ever she was!” From street and lane the people went crowding to see the strange sight, and would have overrun the house, but had a reception by no means cordial: the farmer set men at every door, and would admit no one. Angry and ashamed, they all turned and went—except a few of the more inquisitive, who continued lurking about in the hope of hearing something to carry home and enlarge upon.