Anne left the toys and lifted both hands to high heaven.

"Och! Miss Douglas dear, it wasn't for nothing I dreamt last night of
water-horses. The night before ma sister Maggie's man was killed by a
kick from a wicked grey horse (Angus M'Veecar was his name, and a fine
young lad he was) I dreamt I saw one. As big as three hills it was,
with an awful starin' white face, and a tail on it near as long as
from Portree to Sligachen. It give a great screech, and a wallop in
the face of me, and jumped into the loch, and by milkin'-time next
morning--a Thursday it was--ma sister Maggie came into the door
cryin', 'Och and och, ma poor man, and him so kind and so young,' and
fell on the floor as stiff as a board."

Anne comes from Skye, and often tells me about water-horses and
such-like odd denizens of that far island; and I find her soft
Highland speech, with its "ass" for "as" and "ch" for "j," very
diverting; but this time I wasn't amused.

"But nothing _has_ happened, Anne. What are you talking about? Where
is my brother?"

"Mercy on us all, how can I tell? The mistress and the young gentleman
has never come in, and the master says to me, 'Fetch me my flask,
Anne,' says he; and fetch it I did, and he drove away, an' I'm sure as
I'm sittin' here I didn't see the water-horse for nothing. What does a
flask mean but an accident? Och--och, and a nice laughin'-faced young
gentleman he was, too."

If life is going to contain many such half-hours I don't see how I am