as he expected, and read thus:

"Keep that Scot amused for an hour, and meet me at Semple's landing at nine o'clock. Harry."

"Oh! Oh!" he said with an intense inward passion. "I am to be amused! I am to be cajoled! deceived! that Scot is to be used for some purpose, and by St. Andrew, I'll wager it is treason. This affair must be looked into--quick, too." With this thought he put the paper in his pocket, and followed Maria to the gate where she stood talking with Agnes.

"I will bid you good-night," he said with a purposed air of offense. "I am sure that I am an intruder on more welcome company."

He would listen to no explanations or requests. Maria became suddenly kind, and assumed the prettiest of her coaxing ways, but he knew she was only "amusing" him, and he would not respond to what he considered her base, alluring treachery.

"There, now, Maria! You have been very foolish," said Agnes. "Captain Macpherson is angry. You ought to have been particularly kind to him tonight--after Harry."

"You were so selfish, Agnes--so unreasonably selfish! You might have let me go to the gate with Harry. I never had a chance to say 'good-bye' to him; there you stood, watching for Uncle Neil, and I was on pins and needles of anxiety. Why didn't you stay with the man, and let me go to the gate?"

"If you must know why; I had some money to give Harry. Could I do that before Captain Macpherson?"

"I hate the man! I am glad he has gone! I hope he will never come again!"

"I do not think he will, Maria."

They went into the house thoroughly vexed with each other, and Maria said in a tone of pique or offense, "I wonder what delays my uncle! I wish he would come!"

In reality Neil was no later than usual, but Maria was quivering with disappointment and annoyance, and when he did arrive it was not possible for anyone to escape the influence of an atmosphere charged with the miserable elements of frustrated happiness. Maria was not a girl to bear disagreeable things alone or in silence. She would talk only of Macpherson and his unwelcome visit; "but he always did come when he was not wanted," she said angrily. "Last Sunday when grandmother was sick, and I was writing a long letter to father, and nobody cared to see him at all, enter Captain Macpherson with 

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