Marget sniffed. "I dinna see ony hardness aboot it. You hev a' the facts; a' that you've got to dae is write them doon."
"It certainly sounds very easy put in that way," Ann said; "but facts alone are dull things."
"But ony thing else wad juist be lees."
Ann began to laugh. "But, Marget," she protested, "I could put all the facts of Mother's life into one page—born, married, number of children, and so on; but that wouldn't be any sort of record to hand down to the children. You want all sorts of little everyday touches that will make them see the home that their father was brought up in."
"Everyday touches," Marget repeated; "d'ye mean what we hed for oor denners an' aboot washin' days? But thaes no things to write aboot. I could tell ye some rale fine things to pit in a book. One Setterday I let in a young man to see the maister—a rale weel pit-on young man he was, an' I showed him into the study, an' what d'ye think was the very first thing he said to the maister?"
Marget leant forward impressively. "He said that he had had a veesion to kill a man an' had been guided to oor Manse. Eh, I say! Sic a fricht I got when I heard aboot it! It juist lets ye see how carefu' ye should be aboot lettin' folk in even if they look respectable."
"And how did Father get rid of him?" Ann asked.
"You tell her, Mem." Marget nodded towards her mistress, and Mrs. Douglas said:
"He was a poor fellow whose brain had gone from over-study. Your father talked quietly to him, and said that Saturday morning was a bad time to come, and suggested that he should put it off till Monday. He went away quite peaceably, and your father went out after him and had him followed, for he was a dangerous lunatic. On the Sunday we were afraid to leave anybody in the house in case he came back, so we all went to church—even Jim the baby! On the Monday we heard that he was in an asylum. It was a tragic case."
"We got some awfu' frichts in the Kirkcaple Manse," said Marget; "but I dinna mind nane in Glesgae; we had folk a' round us there. Eh, Mem, d'ye mind the day the maister brocht in the auld-claes wife?"