“She needna have been in such an awfu’ hurry; she might have waited a while, if it had only been for the thought of what folk might say,” muttered the Mistress to herself, very well knowing all the time, though she would not acknowledge it to herself, that Katie Logan had no means whatever of knowing what precious missive had come in the Kirkbride letter-bag that day. And when the Mistress intimated the fact with a little heat and excitement, Katie blushed and felt uncomfortable. She was conscious, too; she did not like to ask a natural question about Huntley. She sat embarrassed at the homely tea-table, looking at the cream scones which Marget had made in honor of the minister, while Dr. Logan and the Mistress kept up the conversation between them--and when her father rose after tea to go out, as was his custom, to call at the nearest cottages, Katie would fain have gone too, had that not been too great an invasion of established rule and custom, to pass without immediate notice. She sat still accordingly by the table with her work, the Mistress sitting opposite with _her_ work also, and her mind intent upon Huntley’s letter. The room was very still and dim, with its long background of shade, sometimes invaded by a red glimmer of fire, but scarcely influenced by the steady light of the two candles, illuminating those two faces by the table; and the Mistress and her visitor sat in silence without any sound but the motion of their hands, and the little rustle of their elbows as they worked. This silence became very embarrassing after a few minutes, and Katie broke it at last by an inquiry after Cosmo--where was he when his mother heard last? “The laddie is a complete wanderer,” said the Mistress, not without a little complacence. “I could not undertake to mind, for my part, all the places he’s been in--though they’re a’ names you see in books--he’s been in Eetaly, and he’s been in Germany, and now he’s back again in France; but I canna say he forgets hame either,” she added, with a tender pride, “only the like of him must improve his mind; and foreign travel, folk say, is good for that--though I canna say I ever had much to do with foreigners, or likit them mysel’.” “Did you ever hear of any one from this country marrying a Frenchman, Mrs. Livingstone?” asked Katie. “Marrying a Frenchman? I’ll warrant have I--it’s no’ such a great wonder, but the like of me might hear tell of it in a lifetime,” said the Mistress, with a little offense, “but marriage is no’ aye running in everybody’s head, Miss Katie, and there’s little fear of my Cosmo bringing me hame a French wife.”