“Ah, lad! out once more,” he cries joyfully. “Och, man! it’s myself that is glad to see you.”
The moisture had gathered in the honest fellow’s eye. Kenneth smiled faintly.
“You’ll soon see me on foot again, the doctor says.”
“But, man, if I live to be as auld as Methuselah, I’ll never forget that dreary nicht your Kooran came howling to the door. He would hardly give me time to put my plaid on, and then he led me away and away to Brownie’s Howe, and I found your body—there seemed no life in it—and carried you hame here on my shoulder.
“Ay, and Kooran has never left ye one hour since then, nor Nancy’s cat either. She came here the very day after Nancy’s funeral. Poor auld Nancy! How quietly she wore away. And how sensible she was to the last. And she told me a story about the laird, our dear laird McGregor, that you maunna hear noo, Kenneth. Good-bye. I’m off to the hills. Mind to keep the wind from him, Archie.”
“How I should like to go too, Archie,” said Kenneth.
“Oh!” said the boy, “that will soon be now. And oh! how bonnie the woods are, and the birds have all begun to build.”
“Are the woods very bonnie, Archie?”
“Oh! delightful,” cried the boy. “The moss is so soft and green under the trees. The wild flowers are creeping out and blowing on the banks. The pine trees are all stuck over with long white-green fingers.”