218 The Little Minister

“No, it isn’t, but never mind. Perhaps you
have fallen to Miss Pennycuick’s piano? Did
you hear it going as we passed the house?”

“She seems always to be playing on her

iano.

“Not she; but you are supposed to be
musical, and so when she sees you from her
window she begins to thump. If I am in the
school wynd and hear the piano going, I know
you will turn the corner immediately. However,
I am glad to hear it is not Miss Pennycuick.
Then it is the factor at the Spittal’s lassie? Well
done, sir. You should arrange to have the wed-
ding at the same time as the old earl’s, which
comes off in summer, I believe.”

“One foolish marriage is enough in a day,
doctor.”

“Eh? You call him a fool for marrying a
young wife? Well, no doubt he is, but he
would have been a bigger fool to marry an old
one. However, it is not Lord Rintoul we are
discussing, but Gavin Dishart. I suppose you
know that the factor’s lassie is an heiress?”

“¢ And, therefore, would scorn me.”

“Try her,” said the doctor, drily. “Her father
and mother, as 1 know, married on a ten-pound
note. But if I am wrong again, I must adopt
the popular view in Thrums. It is a Glasgow
lady, after all? Man, you needn’t look indignant
at hearing that the people are discussing your in-
tended. You can no more stop it than a doctor’s
orders could keep Lang Tammas out of church.
They have discovered that she sends you flowers
twice every week.”