"I saw that," said Mr. Jamieson. "I hope it won't mean trouble."
"It seems a pointless crime," said Elizabeth.
"Buff, come out of the burn, you water-kelpie, and take your tea."
Buff was trying to drag a large stone from the bed of the stream, and was addressing it as he had heard the stable-boy address the pony—"Stan' up, ye brit! Wud ye, though?"—but at his sister's command he ceased his efforts and crawled up the bank to have his hands dried in his father's handkerchief.
It never took Buff long to eat a meal, and in a very few minutes he had eaten three scones and drunk two cups of milk, and laid himself face down-wards in the heather to ruminate.
"Mr. Jamieson," he said suddenly, "if a robber stole your money and went in a ship to South Africa, how would you get at him?"
Mr. Jamieson, unversed in the ways of criminals, was at a loss.
"I doubt I would just need to lose it," he said.
This was feeble. Buff turned to his father and asked what course he would follow.
"I think," said Mr. Seton, "that I would cable to the police to board the ship at the first port."