And now at last had come the worst thing of all: Gibbie had discovered the corn-bin, and having no notion but that everything in the stable was for the delectation of the horses, had been feeding them largely with oats--a delicacy with which, in the plenty of other provisions, they were very sparingly supplied; and the consequences had begun to show themselves in the increased unruliness of the more wayward amongst them.

Gibbie had long given up resorting to the ceiling, and remained in utter ignorance of the storm that was brewing because of him.
The same day brought things nearly to a crisis; for the overfed Snowball, proving too much for Fergus's horsemanship, came rushing home at a fierce gallop without him, having indeed left him in a ditch by the roadside.

The remark thereupon made by the men in his hearing, that it was his own fault, led him to ask questions, when he came gradually to know what they attributed to him, and was indignant at the imputation of such an employment of his mornings to one who had his studies to attend to--scarcely a wise line of defence where the truth would have been more credible as well as convincing--namely, that at the time when those works of supererogation could alone be effected, he lay as lost a creature as ever sleep could make of a man.
In the evening, Jean sought a word with Donal, and expressed her surprise that he should be able to do everybody's work about the place, warning him it would be said he did it at the expense of his own.

But what could he mean, she said, by wasting the good corn to put devilry into the horses?
Donal stared in utter bewilderment.
He knew perfectly that to the men suspicion of him was as impossible as of one of themselves.

Did he not sleep in the same chamber with them?
Could it be allusion to the way he spent his time when out with the cattle that Mistress Jean intended?
He was so confused, looked so guilty as well as astray, and answered so far from any point in Jean's mind, that she at last became altogether bewildered also, out of which chaos of common void gradually dawned on her mind the conviction that she had been wasting both thanks and material recognition of service, where she was under no obligation.
Her first feeling thereupon was, not unnaturally however unreasonably, one of resentment--as if Donal, in not doing her the kindness her fancy had been attributing to him, had all the time been doing her an injury; but the boy's honest bearing and her own good sense made her, almost at once, dismiss the absurdity.
Then came anew the question, utterly unanswerable now--who could it be that did not only all her morning work, but, with a passion for labour insatiable, part of that of the men also?
She knew her nephew better than to imagine for a moment, with the men, it could be he.