in which the sowers were busy, to the sheltering woods glistening greenly in the sun, and the blue hills in the hazy distance seeming to shut in the world.  It was her pride and pleasure to point out to her companion, as they walked, each familiar and cherished landmark, and though Liz did not say much, it was evident that she was in a manner lifted out of herself.  The pure, fragrant air blowing about her, the wide and wonderful beauty of green fields and sunny slopes, filled the soul of Liz with a vague, yearning wonder which was almost pain.  It brought home to her sharply a sense of all she had lost in the great and evil city; it was like a revelation of some boundless good of which she had hitherto lived in ignorance, and it awakened in her a bitter regret, which was in very truth rebellious anger, that the beauty of the earth should have so long been hid from her.

‘It’s a shame,’ she said,—­’a horrid shame, that we should never hae kent there was a place like this ootside o’ Glesca.  Wha is’t made for?—­the rich, I suppose, as the best things are.’

‘Oh no,’ said Teen quite gently.  ’There are plenty puir folk in the country, an’ bad folk tae.  Mrs. Galbraith says there’s as muckle drink drucken in Poosie Nancie’s on Seterday nicht as in Johnnie Shields’ in the Wynd, but some way it seems different.  Look, see, thonder’s the big gate o’ Bourhill.  Eh, I wonder if Miss Gladys is hame?’

‘I say, Teen, ye are very fond o’ her, surely?’ said Liz curiously.  ‘Since when?  Ye didna like her sae weel that nicht I left ye to tak’ her hame frae the Ariel.’

‘No, but I didna ken her then.  Yes, I’m fond o’ her, an’ there’s naething I wadna dae for her.  I wad let her walk abune me if it wad dae her ony guid,’ said the little seamstress, her plain face glorified once more by the great love which had grown up within her till it had become the passion of her life.

‘Ye needna fash; that’s the way I’ve heard lassies speak aboot men, an’ ye get a’ yer thanks in ae day,’ said Liz bitterly.  ’The best thing onybody can dae in this world is to look efter number one.  It’s the only thing worth livin’ for.  I wish I had never been born, an’ I hope I’ll no’ live lang, that’s mair.’

‘Oh, Liz, wheesht!’

‘What for should I wheesht?  It’s no’ the first time I’ve been doon at the Broomielaw takin’ a look roon for a likely place to jump in quietly frae.  That’ll be my end, Teen Ba’four, as sure as I’m here the day; then they’ll hae a paragraph in the News, an’ bury me in the Puirhoose grave.  It’s a lively prospect.’

Teen said nothing, only made a vow within herself that she would do what she could to avert from the girl she loved such a melancholy fate.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

IN VAIN.