This was owing in
part at least to the state of his hand; but if he had ever wished to be
freed from the necessity of using the lash, he might have derived hope
from the fact that somehow or other the boys were during this week no
worse than usual. I do not pretend to explain the fact, and beg leave
to refer it to occult meteorological influences.
As soon as school was over on that first day of Alec's absence, Annie
darted off on the road to Howglen, where he lived, and never dropped
into a walk till she reached the garden-gate. Fully conscious of the
inferiority of her position, she went to the kitchen door. The door was
opened to her knock before she had recovered breath enough to speak.
The servant, seeing a girl with a shabby dress, and a dirty bonnet,
from underneath which hung disorderly masses of hair--they would have
_glinted_ in the eye of the sun, but in the eye of the maid they looked
only dusky and disreputable--for Annie was not kept so tidy on the
interest of her money as she had been at the farm--the girl, I say,
seeing this, and finding besides, as she thought, that Annie had
nothing to say, took her for a beggar, and returning into the kitchen,
brought her a piece of oat-cake, the common dole to the young
mendicants of the time.
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