"O!" she cried, "you have been seeking your sixpence: did you get it?"

I told her no; but now I had met with her my walk was not in vain.
"Though I have seen you to-day already," said I, and told her where and
when.

"I did not see you," she said. "My eyes are big, but there are better
than mine at seeing far. Only I heard singing in the house."

"That was Miss Grant," said I, "the eldest and the bonniest."

"They say they are all beautiful," said she.

"They think the same of you, Miss Drummond," I replied, "and were all
crowding to the window to observe you."

"It is a pity about my being so blind," said she, "or I might have seen
them too. And you were in the house? You must have been having the fine
time with the fine music and the pretty ladies."

"There is just where you are wrong," said I; "for I was as uncouth as a
sea-fish upon the brae of a mountain. The truth is that I am better
fitted to go about with rudas men than pretty ladies."

"Well, I would think so too, at all events!" said she, at which we both
of us laughed.

"It is a strange thing, now," said I. "I am not the least afraid with
you, yet I could have run from the Miss Grants. And I was afraid of your
cousin too."