'It won't do you any good, mother, ye ken that,' he said, striving still to speak gently, though repulsion now mingled with his pity. 'A good dinner or supper would do ye more good. I'll bring in a bit steak, if ye'll cook it.' 'I've nae stammick for meat,' she said, relapsing into her dull state. 'I'm no' lang for this world, an' my wee drap's the only comfort I hae. Ye'll maybe wish ye hadna been as ill to me by an' by.' 'I'm comin' alang some nicht, Wat,' said Liz, who invariably treated such remarks with the most profound contempt, ignoring them entirely. 'D'ye think Skinny'll let me in?' 'I daresay,' answered Walter abruptly, and, sitting down on the window-box, he looked through the blindless window upon the masses of roofs and the twinkling lights of the great city. His heart was heavy, his soul sick within him. His home--so poor a home for him, and for all who called it by that sweet name--had never appeared a more miserable and homeless place. It was not the smallness nor the poverty of its furnishing which concerned him, but the human beings it sheltered, who lay a burden upon his heart. Liz was out of bed, crouching over the fire, with an old red shawl wrapped round her--a striking-looking figure in spite of her general _deshabille_, a girl at whom all men and many women would look twice. He wished she were less striking, that her appearance had matched the only destiny she could look for--grey, meagre, commonplace, hopeless as a dull November day. 'Your pecker's no' up, Wat?' she said, looking at him rather keenly. 'What are ye sae doon i' the mooth for?' Walter made no reply. Truth to tell, he would have found it difficult to give expression to his thoughts. 'He's aye doon i' the mooth when he comes here, Liz,' said the mother, with a passing touch of spirit. 'We're ower puir folk for my lord noo that he's gettin' among the gentry.' 'The gentry of Argyle Street an' the Sautmarket, mother?' asked Walter dryly. 'They'll no' do much for ye.' 'Is Skinny no' gaun to raise yer screw, Wat?' asked Liz. 'It's high time he was thinkin' on't.' 'I'll ask him one o' these days, but he might as well keep the money as me. This is a bottomless pit,' he said, with bitterness. 'It could swallow a pound as quick as five shillings, an' never be kent.' 'Ye're richt, Wat; but I wad advise ye to stick in to Skinny. He has siller, they say, an' maybe ye'll finger it some day.' One night not long after, Liz presented herself at the house in Colquhoun Street, to return the visit of Gladys. As it happened, Walter was not in, having heard of a night school where the fees were so small as to be within the range of his means. Gladys looked genuinely pleased to see her visitor, though she hardly recognised in the fashionably-dressed young lady the melancholy-looking girl she had seen lying on the kitchen bed in the house of the Hepburns. 'Daur I come in? Would he no' be mad?' asked Liz, when they shook hands at the outer door.