‘It’s no likely he was affronted when he said he’d come back to-morrow.’

The smile of satisfaction came again.

‘Did he carry his silver-knobbed cane and wear his green coat, Jeanie?’

’Ay, he wore his green coat, and he looked as handsome a man as ever I saw in my life.’

The coals in the grate shot up a sudden brilliant flame that eclipsed the soft light of the candles and set strange shadows quivering about the huge bed and wardrobe and the dark rosewood tables.  The winsome young woman at her play, and the old dame living back in a tale that was long since told, exchanged nods and smiles at the thought of the handsome visitor in his green coat.  The whisper of the aged voice came blithely—­

‘Ay, he is that, Jeanie Trim; as handsome a man as ever trod!’

The maid rose, and passing out observed the discarded basin of broth.

‘What’s this?’ she said.  ’Ye’ll no be able to see Mr. Kinnaird to-morrow if ye don’t take yer soup the night.’

’Gie it to me, Jeanie Trim; I thought he wasna coming again when I said I wouldna.’

The nurse slipped out of the shadow of the wardrobe and went out to tell that the soup was being eaten.

‘Kinnaird,’ repeated the minister meditatively.  ’I never heard my aunt speak the name.’

‘Kinnaird,’ repeated the daughters; and they too searched in their memories.

’I can remember my grandfather and my grandmother—­the married daughter spoke incredulously—­’there was never a gentleman called Kinnaird that any of the family had to do with.  I’m sure of that, or I’d have as much as heard the name.’

The minister shook his head, discounting the certainty.

’Maybe John will remember the name; your father, and your grandfather too, had great talks with him when he was a lad.  I’ll write a line and ask him.  Poor William or Thomas might have known, if they had lived.’

William and Thomas, grey-haired men, respected fathers of families, had already been laid by the side of their father in the burying-ground.  John lived in a distant country, counting himself too feeble now to cross the seas.  The daughters, the younger members of this flock, were passing into advanced years.  The mother sat by her fireside, and smiled softly to herself as she watched the dancing flame, and thought that her young lover would return on the morrow.

The days went on.

‘I cannot think it right to tamper with my mother in this false way.’  The spinster daughter spoke tearfully.

‘Would you rather see Mistress Macdonald die of starvation?’ The doctor spoke sharply; he was tired of the protest.  The doctor approved of the new maid.  ‘She’s a wise-like body,’ he said; ‘let her have her way.’

‘Don’t you know us, mother?’ the daughters would ask patiently, sadly, day by day.  But she never knew them; she only mistook one or the other of them at times for her own mother, of whom she stood in some awe.