The new master's grey eyes grew suddenly narrow; he was well acquainted with all the small tricks to be played upon a newcomer, and had many a time seen this one of a fictitious name successfully practiced. He had been prepared to find this boy hard to manage, but he was disgusted that he should descend to such a small, childish prank. He knew Scotty's name only too well, and, in any case, for a youth with a marked Highland accent, dressed in the grey homespun which seemed the uniform of the clan MacDonald, to stand before him and give himself such a name as this was as stupid as it was insulting. "That is a very clumsy lie," he remarked quietly. Scotty dropped his snowball and stared; for a moment he did not quite comprehend. "What?" he cried artlessly. His look of innocent amazement doubled his listener's indignation. "I said," returned the man very distinctly, "that you have told me a lie, and a very stupid one, for I know your name to be Scot MacDonald, and a rather notorious one you have made it, too." And turning his back in disgust, the new master walked quietly down the snowy road. For an instant Scotty stood glaring after him, every drop of his rebellious blood tingling. He snatched up his snowball again and took aim. If he could only smash that conceited looking hat, or better still, the insufferable white collar! But there was something in the commanding air of the figure that went so steadily onward, not deigning to look back, that held the boy's arm. Instead, he sent the missile crashing into the last remaining pane in the porch window, and went leaping into the school, determined to find Dan and relieve his feelings by working some irreparable damage. The schoolhouse was in a condition to invite depredations. Late in the previous autumn, as soon as the news of the new master's expected advent had come, the matrons of Number Nine had organised a housecleaning campaign in the school. Store Thompson's wife, that queen of housekeepers, headed the expedition against dirt, and even the minister's wife took part. The former lady had long declared that the condition of the schoolhouse was clean ridic'l'us, and now demanded that something be done to better it, for as the new master was coming from the Captain's he was sure to be a gentleman, and most like would be terrible tidy. So the army of housekeepers had charged down upon the schoolhouse, and such a washing and cleansing and renovating as took place had certainly never been paralleled except when the spring winds and waters came swirling down the Oro hills. The poor little building was scarcely recognisable when it emerged from its baptism of soapy water and whitewash. The big girls added an artistic touch by decorating the spotless walls with cedar boughs, until the place smelled as sweet as the swamps of the Oro; and to crown all, the minister presented it with a fine picture of Queen Victoria to be hung above the master's desk.