"Fun, lassie! fun!" exclaimed Carver, as though he was seriously shocked. "Would you speak o' fun and the Holy Scripture lying open before you?"
"O, but, father, I had no mind. A body canna aye be minding. Look and see not for fun, then."
"Tut, tut!" said the mother, becoming impatient, "can you not begin at the fifteenth verse? What dos't matter if ye read it before?"
"Aweel, then, the fifteenth verse, 'Now, when he'"--
"Listen, father!" cried Thora, again interrupting, "did you not hear something?"
"Well did I hear something, and I hear it yet--the rain pelting on the window. I'm sure you've heard it this two hours and more."
"Nay, but it was like something twirling at the handle of the door."
"You hear things nobody else hears, Thora. Who could be at the door on a day like this? You just think you hear things. I was sure 'people' was not the last word."
Carver listened, however, for a time. The rain beat harder than ever on the windows, and from the neighbouring cliffs came the sound of the waves like a rumbling of distant thunder. But as he looked up from his book I knocked gently on the door.
"Who's there?" he asked in a gruff tone that had in it no echo of charity.