’Oh, I know,’ said the editor, and he blushed to the very roots of his long-flowing hair. ’I know. But it’s an old story. It’s all forgotten now.’ ’Well, it is not,’ the young Doctor said ’and that’s the fact. She worries about it continually. Very strange, now, how her mind just happened to take that bent. I don’t remember that we were talking much about the Scotch Highlands. But they must have been in her head when she fell ill; and now it’s nothing else. Well, what is it about the newspaper article, anyway?’ ’Why, nothing to make a fuss about,’ Jack Huysen said, but rather uneasily. ’I thought it was all forgotten. She said as much. Wonder you don’t remember the article—suppose you missed it—but it was about this same Highland fellow, and some verses of his—it was young Regan wrote it—confound him, I’d have kicked him into Lake Michigan before I let him write a line in the paper, if I’d have known there was going to be this trouble about it. And I don’t think now there was much to find fault with—I only glanced over it before sending it to her, and it seemed to me favourable enough—of course, there was a little of the _de haut en bas_ business—you know how young fellows like to write—but it was favourable—very favourable, I should say—however, she chose to work up a pretty high old row on the strength of it when she came home, and I had my work cut out for me before I could pacify her. Why, you don’t say she’s at that again? Women are such curious creatures; they hold on to things so; I wonder, now, why it is she takes such an interest in that fellow—after all this time?’ ’Just as likely as not the merest coincidence—some trifle that got hold of her brain when she first became delirious,’ the young Doctor said. ’I suppose the boating, and the lake, and all that, brought back recollections of the Highlands; and she seems to have been fascinated by the life over there—the wildness of it caught her imagination, I suppose. She must have been in considerable danger once or twice, I should guess; or perhaps she is mixing that up with the mishap of the other day. Well, I know I wish her father were here. We can’t do more than what is being done; still, I wish he were here. If he can get through to Glen Falls to-night, you may depend on it he’ll come along somehow.’ By this time Jack Huysen was nervously pacing up and down—there was no one but themselves in the room. ’Now, look here, Tom,’ he said, presently, ’I wish you would tell me, honour bright: was it a squall that caught the boat, or was it downright carelessness on my part? I may as well know. I can’t take more shame to myself anyhow—and to let you jump in after her, too, when I’m a better swimmer than you are—I must have lost my head altogether——’ ’And much good you’d have done if you had jumped in,’ the Doctor said, ’and left the two women to manage the boat. How should we have got picked up, then?’ ’But about that gybing, now—was it my fault?’