Mrs. Walkingshaw had been dead for many years, and in her stead Heriot's maiden sister, a thin, elderly lady of exemplary views and conduct, ruled her household. As her brother ruled her, he found the arrangement worked admirably. "Are you not coming out with me in the carriage?" said she to her niece that afternoon. Jean excused herself. She had letters she positively must write; and so the two tall horses pranced off, bearing in the very large and very shiny carriage only the exemplary lady. As she heard them clatter off over the resounding granite, Jean gave a little skip. Her eyes danced too and her lips smiled mysteriously. She ran upstairs like a whirlwind and had the drawing-room door shut behind her before she paused. Only then did she seem to feel safely alone and not in the carriage shopping. The room was very long, and very wide, and immensely high, with three tall windows down one side and substantial furniture purchased in the heyday of the Victorian epoch. The slim, fair-haired figure was quite lost in the space considered suitable by an early nineteenth-century architect for the accommodation of a Scottish lady; and the fire made much more of a display, glowing in the gloom of that raw February afternoon. Jean sat by a little writing-table and took up a pen. Then she waited, evidently for ideas to come. Ten minutes later they arrived. The door was softly opened, a voice respectably subdued announced the name of "Mr. Vernon," and the duties of the pen were over. The gentleman who entered made a remarkable contrast to the sedate upholstery. He had a mop of brown hair upon a large and well-shaped head, a broad face with rugged, striking features, very bright blue eyes, a dashing cavalier mustache, and a most engaging smile. His clothes were light of hue and very loose, his figure was of medium height and strongly built, his collar wide open at the neck, and his tie a large silk butterfly of an artistic shade of brown. Altogether he was a most improbable person to find calling upon a daughter of Mr. Heriot Walkingshaw. He gave Jean's hand the grasp of a friend, but his eyes looked on her with a more than friendly light in them. When he spoke, his voice was as pleasant as his smile, and his accents were those of that portion of Britain not yet entirely occupied by the victors of Bannockburn. "It's very good of you to stay in," he said. "Oh, I wasn't going out in any case," said Jean demurely. She seated herself in one corner of the sofa, and the young man, after hesitating for an instant between a seat by her side and a chair close by, and failing to catch her eye to guide him, chose the chair, and for the moment looked unhappy. "I've come to say good-by," he began. She looked up quickly. "Are you going away?" He nodded his brown mop. "Yes, I'm off to London again." "For good?" "I hope so; anyhow, it can't be for much worse than I've done here." "Haven't your pictures been--been appreciated here?" she asked.