"Good God!" he murmured.
Then, with much the expression Crusoe must have worn when he spied the footprint, he turned to his sister, and, grasping a lock of hair upon his brow, bent his head towards her, and demanded—
"What color's that?"
"Dear me," she said, "it looks quite brown. I didn't know you had any brown hair left."
He raised his head and looked at her in solemn silence till she began to feel dreadfully confused. Then he bent again.
"Do you notice anything else?"
"N—no; unless your hair's got thicker. But that's not likely at your time of life."
"It is not likely," said he. "It is most improbable—in fact, it is practically impossible; but it is thicker."
He rubbed his chin and gazed at her with the queerest look. Mary had known him since he trundled a hoop, but she never remembered him go on like this before. As for Heriot, he seemed to be debating whether he should spring something still more surprising on her or not. But she looked so uncomfortable already, so totally without the least clue to his mysterious words, so unconscious of anything stranger about him than his shirt-sleeves and loss of weight, that he only uttered something between a gasp and a sigh, and, turning away from her, took up his brushes to smooth his augmented hairs.
"I'll be down to breakfast in a jiffy," he said.