"Na, na," Robina replied, shaking her head emphatically, "there's noan o' the wee leddy's flesh and blood's Piskeys, I'se warrant. They'll gang tae the kirk wi' their auntie like ither Christian folk."
"What's a Piskey?" asked Montagu of the inquiring mind.
"I'm no very sure," the girl said slowly. "It's a new-fangled kin' o' kirk—is't no?" she added, looking up at Sandie.
Sandie grinned broadly and drew himself up. "I once went into one o' they kirks in Edinbory—" he said with the air of one who has passed through many strange adventures, "on a Sabbath evening," he continued hastily, as Robina looked disapproving. "I gang no place else than oor ain kirk in the mornin'."
"And what like was it?" asked Robina, somewhat reassured by this assertion of orthodoxy.
"Dod' an' it's more than I can say. Ye was aye hoppin' up an' sittin' doon, wi' a wee thing singin' here an' a wee bit prayin' there, an' a wee sma' readin'. Ma certy! there was sae monny preeleeminaries 'at I never thocht we'd reach the sairmon. An' when we did it was just as scampit as a' the rest. An' what wi' human hymns an men i' their sarks jumpin' up here an' there, it was mair like play-actin' than a kirk. Nae mair Piskeys for me, I can tell ye!"
"But what is a Piskey?" Montagu again demanded.
"The auld gentleman wha' lives wi' us is a Piskey, so I've heard," Robina said in a low voice.
"I can well believe that," Sandie remarked meaningly, and tapped his forehead.
"Me go jive in caht!" Edmund exclaimed for about the thirtieth time, this time with an ominous warning of tears in his voice.