It was all the work of a second; and the next instant they were indoors, and in the little parlour; but in that brief space of time a great change had taken place. Indeed, Maisrie’s mortification was a piteous thing to see; it seemed so hard she should have had to endure this humiliation under the very eyes of her lover; she would not look his way at all; she busied herself with putting things on the table; her downcast face was overwhelmed with confusion and shame. For surely Vincent would know what that paper was? The appearance of the man—his hanging about—her grandfather’s angry frown—all pointed plainly enough. And that it should happen at the end of this long and happy day—this day of reconciliation—when she had tried so assiduously to be kind to him—when he had spoken so confidently of the future that lay before them! It was as if some cruel fate had interposed to say to him: ’Now you see the surroundings in which this girl has lived: and do you still dream of making her your wife?’ And perhaps old George Bethune noticed this shame and vexation on the part of his granddaughter, and may have wished to divert attention from it; at all events, when he had brewed his toddy, and lit his pipe, and drawn his chair in towards the fire, he set off upon one of his monologues, quite in the old garrulous vein; and he was as friendly towards Vincent as though this visit had been quite anticipated. Maisrie sat silent and abashed; and Vincent, listening vaguely, thought it was all very fine to have a sanguine and happy-go-lucky temperament, but that he—that is, the younger man—would be glad to have this beautiful and pensive creature of a girl removed into altogether different circumstances. He knew why she was ashamed and downcast—though, to be sure, he said to himself that the serving of a writ was no tremendous cataclysm. Such little incidents must necessarily occur in the career of any one who had such an arrogant disdain of pounds and pence as her grandfather professed. But that Maisrie should have to suffer humiliation: that was what touched him to the quick. He looked at her—at her beautiful and wistful eyes, and the sensitive lines of her profile and under-lip; and his heart bled for her. And all this following upon her outspoken avowal of that morning seemed to demand some more definite and immediate action on his part—when once the quiet of the night had enabled him to consider his position.