In a little while there was a knock at the door, and she had to dry her
eyes and open to the neighbors, who had many curiosities to satisfy. David
and "Maister Campbell" were gone, and they did not fear Maggie. She had
to enter common life again, to listen to wonderings, and congratulations,
and wearisome jokes. To smile, to answer questions, and yet, to hear amid
all the tumult of words and laughter, always one voice, the sound of which
penetrated all other sounds; to be conscious of only one thought, which
she had to guard jealously, with constant care, lest she should let it
slip amid the clash of thoughts around her.

Oh, how she hated the sunshine and the noisy babble of it! How feverishly
she longed for the night, for the shadows in which she could weep, for the
darkness in which she could be herself, for the isolation in which she
could escape from slavery! It was an entirely new, strange feeling to her.
In that simple community; joys and sorrows were not for secrecy. A wedding
or a funeral was the affair of every one. Women were expected to weep
publicly, and if they wore sackcloth and ashes, to wear it in the sight of
every one. Love affairs were discussed without ceremony, and often
arranged in full family conclaves. All married strictly within their own
rank; not once in a generation did a fisher-girl marry "out of the boats."

Maggie would have been really afraid to speak of her love for a gentleman
like Allan Campbell. She knew well what a storm of advices, perhaps even
of scorn and reproaches, her confidence would be met with. Yet she would
talk freely enough about Angus Raith, and when Christie Buchan told her
Raith's version of their quarrel, she did not hesitate to fly into a
passion of indignation, and stigmatize him freely as "a liar and a
cowardly ne'er-do-weel."