’Ay, so I hear,’ said the young lawyer, not without a dryness in his tone. ’I have a letter from your mother, too, you see,’ and he tapped an open missive on his desk. ’There is a beautiful new lady coming home with mother, to stay with us,’ said Danny, lifting his large dark eyes to his cousin’s face. ’You don’t say so!’ said Cousin Archie. He took the child up on his knee. ’Yes,’ continued Danny, settling himself against a comfortable shoulder. ’She has a little brother of her own, and so she is to be like a big sister to us.’ ’Oh, that’s the idea, is it?’ said Archibald Herries. ’And does your mother say where this mighty fine young lady is to find a room?’ ’It was Jean sent us to ask you that,’ said Willy, innocently. ’I sleep with mother, you know, and Danny by Jean in the other room, but mother says the lady will want Jean’s bed, and Jean would know where she’s to sleep, and may she get M’Alister, our landlord, to hire us the garret? It’s empty, and ’twill make no difference to him.’ ’Except in the matter of the rent—none whatever, Willy,’ said Herries, more drily than ever. ’But that’s a secondary matter which we need not mention.’ He was frowning, and his delicate features looked severe and cold. Nevertheless a smile lurked about his lips, and it ended in a rather bitter laugh. ’Tell Jean to get the garret from M’Alister,’ he said. ’You would not put her out in the street for the new lady—would you, Danny?’ ’To be sure not,’ said Danny solemnly. Herries had absently held one of the boy’s thin legs, and with a movement the ragged foot-gear caught his eye. ’That’s a sorry shoe, Danny,’ he said. ’What’s the matter with it?’ ’Well,’ said Danny, gravely, ’it is the sole coming off, I think. It has been coming off for a long time.’ ’Why don’t you get it mended, man?’ the cousin enquired. ’It should have been mended,’ Danny answered, lifting those soft, dark eyes of his again. ’But Jean said there was no more money.’ Herries threw back his head and laughed. ’That’s a sad complaint,’ he said. ’But come, boys, I’ll walk home with you, and on the way we’ll get a new pair of shoes for Danny. Come!’ The three issued forth together, and walked along George Street eastward. At the head of the Leith Row they went into a shoemaker’s, and Danny was fitted with a stout new pair of shoes, for which his cousin paid. Then they began to climb the old town at a brisk pace, but presently the younger child lagged behind. ’Are the new shoes hurting you, my man?’ asked Herries. His usually rather curt tones were very kind when he spoke to the little boy. ’’Tisn’t the shoes, Cousin Archie,’ said Willy, answering for his brother. ’But Danny has a sore leg that makes him hirple when he walks far.’ ’Oh! he has, has he?’ said Herries, looking at the child in perplexity. ’Come, boy, I can carry you up the brae, I think.’