But he did not do it the first moment, and he could not the second.

Yet he did rise and go to her, and in his awkward way try to comfort her.

"Dinna greet that way, Mysie, woman," he said; "if I hae done amiss, I'll mak amends." That was a great thing for Andrew Cargill to say; Mysie hardly knew how to believe it.

Such a confession was a kind of miracle, for she judged things by results and was not given to any consideration of the events that led up to them.

She could not know, and did not suspect, that all the bitter truths she had spoken had been gradually forcing themselves on her husband's mind.