For, as there was nothing to be done out of doors, and he was not fond of being idle, he had been busy all the morning in the woodhouse, sawing and splitting for the winter-store, and working the better that he knew what honorarium awaited his appearance in the kitchen.

In the woodhouse he only heard the wind and the rain and the roar, he saw nothing of the flood; when he entered the kitchen, it was by the back door, and he sat there without the smallest suspicion of what was going on in front.
Ginevra had had no companion since Nicie left her, and her days had been very dreary, but this day had been the dreariest in her life.
Mistress Mac Farlane made herself so disagreeable that she kept away from her as much as she could, spending most of her time in her own room, with her needlework and some books of poetry she had found in the library.

But the poetry had turned out very dull--not at all like what Donal read, and throwing one of them aside for the tenth time that day, she wandered listlessly to the window, and stood there gazing out on the wild confusion--the burn roaring below, the trees opposite ready to be torn to pieces by the wind, and the valley beneath covered with stormy water.

The tumult was so loud, that she did not hear a gentle knock at her door: as she turned away, weary of everything, she saw it softly open--and there to her astonishment stood Gibbie--come, she imagined, to seek shelter, because their cottage had been blown down .-- Calculating the position of her room from what he knew of its windows, he had, with the experienced judgment of a mountaineer, gone to it almost direct.
"You mustn't come here, Gibbie," she said, advancing.

"Go down to the kitchen, to Mistress Mac Farlane.