CHAPTER XXVII "THEN, HEIGH-HO, THE MOLLY!" "Charlotte!" said I, taking in a sudden pity a step nearer and holding out my hand; but she only snatched her arm away fretfully and cried the more bitterly. "Has your father been speaking unkindly to you?" I asked her, being much surprised. She shook her head, and a wet handkerchief plashed on my hand like a sob as she shook it out. "What is it, then?" I asked, more and more amazed at the turn things were taking. Never had I thought for a moment that Charlotte would not be as pleased and happy to have me as I was the reverse. "Oh," she burst out at last, sobbing between each hurried phrase, "I don't blame you, Duncan. It's all that horrid old cat, Miss Seraphina--Diabolina, the girls call her--she writes everything we do to our people at home. She's always writing, and she spies on us, too, and listens--opens our letters! She has brought all this on me----" "Brought what on you?" I inquired blankly. "Having to marry you and all!" she said, and had recourse to her wet handkerchief again. But that being altogether too sodden to afford her any relief, she signalled to me, as if I had been Agnes Anne or another girl, to pass her mine. Fortunately for once I could do so without shame. For Miss Irma had been teaching me things--or at least the desire to appear well in her eyes. Charlotte Anderson did not appear to notice, but went on crying. "And don't you want to marry me, Lottie?" I said softly, taking her hand. She let me now, perhaps considered as the proprietor of the handkerchief. "Of course I don't," said she. "Oh, how could I?" Now this, considered apart, was certainly hurtful to my pride. For, having frequently considered my person, as revealed in my mother's big Sunday mirror, I thought that she could very well. On my side there was certainly nothing to render the matter impossible. Moreover, how about our walks and talks! She had, then, merely been playing with me. Oh, Perfidy, thy name is Woman! I was silent and paused for an explanation. I soon got it, considered as before, as the sympathetic owner of the handkerchief. "It's Tam Galaberry," she said, "my cousin, you know, Duncan. He used to come to see me ... before ... before you! But his sister went to Dumfries to learn the high-class millinery, and since then Miss Seraphina cannot thole him. As if he had anything to do with that. And she wrote home, and my father threatened Tam to shoot him with the gun if he came after me--all because we were cousins--and only seconds at any rate. Oh-h-h-h! What _shall_ I do?" I had to support Charlotte here--though merely as handkerchief-holder and in the purest interests of the absent Mr. Thomas Gallaberry. But the relief to my own mind, in spite of the hurt to my pride, was immediate and enormous. But a thought leaped up in my heart which cooled me considerably. "Oh, Lottie," I said, as sadly as I could, "you have been false and deceitful. You have come near to breaking my heart----"