"Thanks! we were only a little tired, and are quite rested now," she said. "How beautifully sheltered your house is!" "On the side of the sea, yes," answered Mrs. Macruadh; "but not much on the east where we want it most. The trees are growing, however!" When the sisters were out of sight of the cottage-- "Well!" remarked Christina, "he's a nice young man too, is he not? Exceedingly well bred! And what taste he has! He knows how to amuse ladies!" Mercy did not answer. "I never heard anything so disgusting!" pursued Christina. "But," suggested Mercy, "you like to READ horrid stories, Chrissy! You said so only yesterday! And there was nothing in what he told us that oughtn't to be spoken about." "What!--not those hideous coffins--and the bodies dropping out of them--all crawling, no doubt?" "That is your own, Chrissy! You KNOW he did not go so far as that! If Colonel Webberly had told you the story, you would have called it charming--in fun, of course, I mean!" But Christina never liked the argumentum ad feminam. "I would not! You know I would not!" she exclaimed. "I do believe the girl has fallen in love with the horrid man! Of the two, I declare, I like the ploughman better. I am sorry I happened to vex him; he is a good stupid sort of fellow! I can't bear this man! How horribly he fixed his eyes on you when he was talking that rubbish about the ball-dress!" "He was anxious to make himself understood. I know he made me think I must mind what I was about!" "Oh, nonsense! We didn't come into this wilderness to be preached to by a lay John the Baptist! He is an ill-bred fellow!" She would not have said so much against him, had not Mercy taken his part. Mercy rarely contradicted her sister, but even this brief passage with a real man had roused the justice in her. "I don't agree with you, Chrissy," she said. "He seems to me VERY MUCH of a gentleman!" She did not venture to say all she felt, not choosing to be at absolute variance, and the threatened quarrel blew over like a shower in spring. But some sort of impression remained from the words of Ian on the mind of Mercy, for the next morning she read a chapter in the book of Genesis, and said a prayer her mother had taught her. CHAPTER XII. AMONG THE HILLS. When Mr. and Mrs. Palmer reached Inverness, they found they could spend a few days there, one way and another, to good purpose, for they had friends to visit as well as shopping to do. Mr. Palmer's affairs calling him to the south were not immediately pressing, and their sojourn extended itself to a full week of eight days, during which the girls were under no rule but their own. Their parents regarded them as perfectly to be trusted, nor were the girls themselves aware of any reason why they should not be so regarded.