Then Muckle Alick went round and told his wife.
"It will be the laddie frae Enbra that got them the wark in the mill, and gied up his wood hut to the bairns to leeve in. What for did ye no bring him to see Hugh Boy and the bairn?"
"I dinna ken that he gied me the chance," said Alick. "He was aff like a shot to Loch Spellanderie. I wad gie a shilling to hear what Mistress McWalter will say to him when he gets there. I houp that it'll no make her unkind to the lassie! If it does, I'll speak to her man. And at the warst she can aye come back to us. At a pinch we could be doing without her wage!"
"Aweel," said his wife, "the loon will be near there by this time."
And the loon was.
Cleg was just turning up over the hill road towards Loch Spellanderie, when he heard that most heartsome sound to the ear of a country boy—the clatter of the pasture bars when the kye are coming home. It is a sound thrilling with reminiscences of dewy eves, or heartsome lowsing times, of forenichts with the lasses, and of all that to a country lad makes life worth living.
But to Cleg the rattle of the bars meant none of these things. Two people were standing by the gate—a boy and a girl. Cleg thought he would ask them if this was the right road to Loch Spellanderie.
But as he came nearer he saw that the girl was Vara herself. She was in close and, apparently, very friendly talk with a stranger—a tall lad with a face like one of the white statues in the museum, at which Cleg had often peeped wonderingly on free days when it was cold or raining outside.
"Vara!" cried Cleg, leaping forward towards his friend.
"Cleg! What are you doing here?" said Vara Kavannah, holding out her hand.