"Ye'll come to the beerial upo' Setterday?" she asked, half inviting,
half enquiring.

"I'm sorry to say, mem, 'at I canna," he answered. "I promised
Maister Graham to tak the schule for him, an' lat him gang."

"Weel, weel! Mr Graham's obleeged to ye, nae doobt, an' we canna
help it. Gie my compliments to yer gran'father."

"I'll du that, mem. He'll be sair pleased, for he's unco gratefu'
for ony sic attention," said Malcolm, and with the words took his
leave.



CHAPTER X: THE FUNERAL


That night the weather changed, and grew cloudy and cold. Saturday
morning broke drizzly and dismal. A northeast wind tore off the
tops of the drearily tossing billows. All was gray--enduring,
hopeless gray. Along the coast the waves kept roaring on the sands,
persistent and fateful; the Scaurnose was one mass of foaming white:
and in the caves still haunted by the tide, the bellowing was like
that of thunder.

Through the drizzle shot wind and the fog blown in shreds from the
sea, a large number of the most respectable of the male population
of the burgh, clothed in Sunday gloom deepened by the crape on