Quietly he takes the sleeping Toddie up, and wraps her in the plaid folds close to his breast. "Come, Tip," he says, and crook in hand goes up the steps and struggles out into the storm and darkness.
On nights like this Eppie always had a light burning in her gable window to guide belated boats, and this was the star old Eean steered by.
"Praise be to Providence you've come," said Eppie. "D'ye mind what nicht this is?"
"Right well I do," said Eean. "Look at the innocent lamb. Take her gently, Eppie. Take her gently."
* * * * * *
When Fred went in with a rush next morning to the room where Toddie slept in a tiny cot, wondering why she had not come down to breakfast, he found the little maiden standing half-dressed before her little mirror, with a thumb in her mouth.
I dare say she had little womanly ways about her, else she would not have been in front of that morsel of mirror. But the thumb in the mouth showed how deep in thought she was.
"Thinking again, Toddie."
"Yes, I'se finking, Fred. Cause, you know, last night I was in Daddy's cave, or was I dleaming?"
"You must have been dreaming, Todd."