“Oh!” said all three simultaneously, with an accent of mixed scorn and relief.  The whole matter was clear to them now.

“And of the right of the synod of the Marrow kirk to control my actions,” continued Ralph.

But the further interest was entirely gone from the question.

“Tell us about her,” they said in unison.

“How do you know it is a ’her’?” asked Ralph, clumsily trying to put off time, like a man.

Kezia laughed on her own account, Keren-happuch, because Kezia laughed, but Jemima said solemnly: 

“I hope she is of a serious disposition.”

“Nonsense! I hope she is pretty,” said Kezia.

“And I hope she will love me,” said little Keren-happuch.

Ralph thought a little, and then, as it was growing dark, he sat on the old sofa with his back to the fading day, and told his love-story to these three sweet girls, who, though they had played with him and been all womanhood to him ever since he came out of petticoats, had not a grain of jealousy of the unseen sister who had come suddenly past them and stepped into the primacy of Ralph’s life.

When he was half-way through with his tale he suddenly stopped, and said: 

“But I ought to have told all this first to your father, because he may not care to have me in his house.  There is only my word for it, after all, and it is the fact that I have not the right to set foot in my own father’s house.”

“We will make our father see it in the right way,” said Jemima quietly.

“Yes,” interposed Kezia, “or I would not give sixpence for his peace of mind these next six months.”

“It is all right if you tell us,” said little Keren-happuch, who was her father’s playmate.  Jemima ruled him, Kezia teased him—­the privilege of beauty—­but it was generally little Keren-happuch who fetched his slippers and sat with her cheek against the back of his hand as he smoked and read in his great wicker chair by the north window.

There was the sound of quick nervous footsteps with an odd halt in their fall on the gravel walk outside.  The three girls ran to the door in a tumultuous greeting, even Jemima losing her staidness for the occasion.  Ralph could hear only the confused babble of tongues and the expressions, “Now you hear, father—­” “Now you understand—­” “Listen to me, father—­” as one after another took up the tale.

Ralph retold the story that night from the very beginning to the professor, who listened silently, punctuating his thoughts with the puffs of his pipe.

When he had finished, there was an unwonted moisture in the eyes of Professor Thriepneuk—­perhaps the memory of a time when he too had gone a-courting.

He stretched the hand which was not occupied with his long pipe to Ralph, who grasped it strongly.

“You have acted altogether as I could have desired my own son to act; I only wish that I had one like you.  Let the Marrow Kirk alone, and come and be my assistant till you see your way a little into the writer’s trade.  Pens and ink are cheap, and you can take my classes in the summer, and give me quietness to write my book on ‘The Abuses of Ut with the Subjunctive.’”