‘I will find out where to write to him,’ said the sailor. ‘We must lose no time, for the letter may take weeks to reach him. I am afraid it is a forlorn hope, Mrs. Stirk, but we’ll do our best. I shall write very urgently to Miss Raeburn and tell her what I have done.’ ‘That’s you!’ exclaimed the old woman. ‘I must send the letter out to Fullarton to be addressed,’ continued he, ‘I have not heard where she is lodging in Edinburgh.’ ‘Dinna hae ony steer wi’ that Barclay,’ said Granny. ‘He’s aye keekin’ an’ speerin’ about what doesna concern him, an’ makin’ work wi’ Mr. Fordyce.’ ‘I will go to the Miss Robertsons this afternoon,’ said he, half to himself. ‘I know Miss Hersey writes to Speid. I suppose that, when I send my letter to him, I may say you have been here, Mrs. Stirk, and speak of your meeting with Miss Raeburn?’ ‘Ye can that,’ replied she, preparing to go, ‘for a’m terrible pleased a’ did it. A’ll awa’ now, sir, an’ thank ye.’ Mrs. Somerville, looking out of the window, watched the Queen of the Cadgers walk down to her cart. A sneer touched the lady’s face as the old woman got in beside her grandson and was driven away. ‘Well,’ said she, as her husband entered, ‘what did that impudent old creature want? You were a long time listening to her.’ ‘She was consulting me about private matters, my dear; and I don’t consider Mrs. Stirk an impudent person.’ ‘You are so fond of being mixed up with common people,’ rejoined his wife, ‘I am sure I never could understand your tastes.’ Had the sailor never been mixed up with common people Mrs. Somerville would not have been sitting where she was. His feelings were stirred a good deal and he was in a mood in which pettinesses were peculiarly offensive to him. Besides that, he was inclined to think Granny’s acquaintance something of an honour. ‘If there were more people in the world like Mrs. Stirk, it would be a good thing for it,’ he said shortly. ‘You are an uncommon silly woman sometimes, Matilda.’ CHAPTER XXV MRS. SOMERVILLE HAS SCRUPLES MRS. SOMERVILLE retired from the breakfast-room in the height of ill-humour: it was not often that her husband spoke to her in so plain a manner and she was full of resentment. She was conscious that she had behaved badly in listening at the door, and, though the act did not seem to her such a heinous offence as it might have done to many others, her conscience aggravated her discomfort.