Before they rose from the supper table, however, there were calls for Mrs. Cameron, calls so insistent and clamorous that, overcoming her embarrassment, she made reply. “We have not yet found out who was responsible for the originating of this great kindness. But no matter. We forgive him, for otherwise my husband and I would never have come to know how rich we are in true friends and kind neighbors, and now that you have built this house let me say that henceforth by day or by night you are welcome to it, for it is yours.”
After the storm of applause had died down, a voice was heard gruffly and somewhat anxiously protesting, “But not all at one time.”
“Who was that?” asked Mandy of young Dent as the supper party broke up.
“That's Smith,” said Dent, “and he's a queer one.”
“Smith?” said Cameron. “The chap meets us everywhere. I must look him up.”
But there was a universal and insistent demand for “the pipes.”
“You look him up, Mandy,” cried her husband as he departed in response to the call.
“I shall find him, and all about him,” said Mandy with determination.
The next two hours were spent in dancing to Cameron's reels, in which all, with more or less grace, took part till the piper declared he was clean done.
“Let Macgregor have the pipes, Cameron,” cried the Inspector. “He is longing for a chance, I am sure, and you give us the Highland Fling.”