“What, and he a priest, too! It's his trade, Mr. Greig, and this Father Hamilton would spoil all if he knew we were indulging ourselves so innocently. What you must do is to send your letters to me in a way that I shall think of before you leave and I shall answer in the same way. But never a word, remember, to his reverence; I depend on your honour for that.” As I was going down the stair a little later, she leaned over the bannister and cried after me: “Mr. Greig,” said she, “ye needna' be sae hainin' wi' your red shoes when ye're traivellin' in the coach. I would be greatly pleased to be thinkin' of you as traivellin' in them a' the time.” I looked up and saw her smiling saucily at me over the rail. “Would you indeed?” said I. “Then I'll never put them aff till I see ye again, when I come back to Dunkerque.” “That is kind,” she answered, laughing outright, “but fair reediculous. To wear them to bed would be against your character for sobriety.” CHAPTER XIX A RAP IN THE EARLY MORNING AWAKENS ME AND I START IN A GLASS COACH UPON THE ODDEST OF JOURNEYS It was the last, for many months, I was to see of my countrywoman. Before the crow of the cock next morning I was on the unending roads, trundling in a noisy vehicle through pitch darkness, my companion snoring stertorous at my side, his huge head falling every now and then upon my shoulder, myself peering to catch some revelation of what manner of country-side we went through as the light from the swinging lanthorn lit up briefly passing banks of frosted hedge or sleeping hamlets on whose pave the hoofs of our horses hammered as they had been the very war-steeds of Bellona. But how came I there? How but by my master's whim, that made him anticipate his departure by three days and drag me from my bed incontinent to set out upon his trip over Europe. I had been sleeping soundly, dreaming I heard the hopper of the mill of Driepps at home banging to make Jock Alexander's fortune, when I awakened, or rather half-wakened, to discover that 'twas no hopper but a nieve at my door, rapping with a vigour to waken the dead. “Come out! Sir Secretary, come out! or I shall pull thy domicile about thine ears,” cried the voice of Father Hamilton. He stood at the door when I opened, wrapped over the chin in a muffler of multitudinous folds, and covered by a roquelaure. “_Pax!_” he cried, thrusting a purple face into the room, “and on with thy boots like a good lad. We must be off and over the dunes before the bell of St. Eloi knocks another nail in the coffin of time.” “What!” I said, dumbfoundered, “are we to start on our journey to-day?”