Two days after the events recorded, as Annie was leaving the kitchen, after worship, to go up to bed, Mr Bruce called her.
"Annie Anderson," he said, "I want to speak to ye."
Annie turned, trembling.
"I see ye ken what it's aboot," he went on, staring her full in the pale face, which grew paler as he stared. "Ye canna luik me i' the face. Whaur's the candy-sugar an' the prunes? I ken weel eneuch whaur they are, and sae do ye."
"I ken naething aboot them," answered Annie, with a sudden revival of energy.
"Dinna lee, Annie. It's ill eneuch to steal, without leein'."
"I'm no leein'," answered she, bursting into tears of indignation. "Wha said 'at I took them?"
"That's naething to the pint. Ye wadna greit that gait gin ye war innocent. I never missed onything afore. And ye ken weel eneuch there's an ee that sees a' thing, and ye canna hide frae hit."
Bruce could hardly have intended that it was by inspiration from on high that he had discovered the thief of his sweets. But he thought it better to avoid mentioning that the informer was his own son Johnnie. Johnnie, on his part, had thought it better not to mention that he had been incited to the act by his brother Robert. And Robert had thought it better not to mention that he did so partly to shield himself, and partly out of revenge for the box on the ear which Alec Forbes had given him. The information had been yielded to the inquisition of the parent, who said with truth that he had never missed anything before; although I suspect that a course of petty and cautious pilfering had at length passed the narrow bounds within which it could be concealed from the lynx eyes inherited from the kingly general. Possibly a bilious attack, which confined the elder boy to the house for two or three days, may have had something to do with the theft; but if Bruce had any suspicions of the sort, he never gave utterance to them.
"I dinna want to hide frae 't," cried Annie. "Guid kens," she went on in desperation, "that I wadna touch a grain o' saut wantin' leave."