‘Haud yer tongue. He doesna look vera canny the day. I’d be sweer[1] to fash him.’ [1] Loth. Gilbert got into the cabriolet gathering up the reins, his thoughts intent upon what he had heard in the house. The mare, rejoiced to be moving, took the first few steps forward in a fashion of her own, making, as he turned the carriage, as though she would back on to the kerbstone. He gave her her head, and drew the whip like a caress softly across her back. She plunged forward, taking hold of the bit, and trotted down the High Street, stepping up like the great lady she was, and despising the ground underneath her. However preoccupied, Speid was not the man to be indifferent to his circumstances when he sat behind such an animal. As they left the town and came out upon the flat stretch of road leading towards Whanland, he let her go to the top of her pace, humouring her mouth till she had ceased to pull, and was carrying her head so that the bit was in line with the point of the shaft. A lark was singing high above the field at one side of him, and, at the other, the scent of gorse came in puffs on the wind from the border of the sandhills. Beyond was the sea, with the line of cliff above Garviekirk graveyard cutting out into the immeasurable water. The sky lay pale above the sea-line. They turned into the road by the Lour bridge from where the river could be seen losing itself in an eternity of distance. In the extraordinary Sunday stillness, the humming of insects was audible as it only is on the first day of the week, when nature itself seems to suggest a suspension of all but holiday energy. The natural world, which recognises no cessation of work, presents almost the appearance of doing so at such times, so great is the effect of the settled habit of thousands of people upon its aspect. The monotony of the motion and the balm of the day began to intoxicate Gilbert. It is not easy to feel that fate is against one when the sun shines, the sky smiles, and the air is quivering with light and dancing shadow; harder still in the face of the blue, endless sea-spaces of the horizon; hard indeed when the horse before you conveys subtly to your hand that he is prepared to transport you, behind the beating pulse of his trot, to Eldorado--to the Isles of the Blessed--anywhere. His heart rose in spite of himself as he got out of the cabriolet at the door of Whanland, and ran his hand down the mare’s shoulder and forelegs. He had brought her in hotter than he liked, and he felt that he should go and see her groomed, for he was a careful horse-master. But somehow he could not. He dismissed her with a couple of approving slaps, and watched her as she was led away. Then, tossing his hat and gloves to Macquean, who had come out at the sound of wheels, he strolled up to the place at which he had once paused with Barclay, and stood looking up the river to the heavy woods of Morphie. ‘If she were here!’ he said to himself, ‘if she were here!’