skirted leftward till we arrived at a quieter street running down to the
line of the wall.

Here every brick and stone was as a familiar friend, for the little
grammar school backed on to the wall at the very spot where the main
street led through the old north gate of the town. Old Master Bloggs lived
in a tiny house on the side of the school away from the gate. There were
the candles flickering in the untidy den in which the old man passed all
his waking hours out of school-time, and there, I doubted not, they would
be guttering away if the Highlanders sacked the town. I led the way across
the little fore-court, paled off from the street by wooden railings,
gently opened the door, and walked in to the dark passage.

The study door was ajar, and we peeped in. There the old, familiar figure
was, eyesight feebler, shoulders rounder, hair whiter, and clothing
shabbier than of yore, crumpled over a massive folio. He was reading
aloud, in a monotonous, squeaky half-pitch. Latin hexameters they were,
for even his voice could not hide all the music in them, and as I listened
it became clear that the old man had that night been moved to select
something appropriate to the occasion, for he was going through the
account of the fall of Troy in the second Aeneid.

I put my fingers on my lips and crept on, followed by Mistress Waynflete.
In the little back room I whispered, "My old school and schoolmaster. We
will not disturb the old man. Poor little Marry-me-quick may have to
suffer on our account, and old Bloggs shall at any rate have the excuse of
knowing nothing about us. He's happy enough over the fall of Troy. Nothing
that he can do can help us. Let him be."

She nodded assent and I looked round. Opening a cupboard, I found half a