"Up with you, mannie, or I'll be dressed before you, and
I ken very well you'd not like to be beaten by a lassie, and her
your own sister, too."
Jock cuddled down farther into the blankets without answering,
and Jean began putting on her clothes. It seemed but a moment
before she slid to the floor, rolled her sleeves high above a
pair of sturdy elbows, and went to finish her toilet at the
basin. There she washed her face and combed her hair, while Jock,
cautiously opening one eye again, observed her from his safe
retreat. He watched her part her hair, wet it, plaster it
severely back from her brow, and tie it firmly in place with a
piece of black ribbon. Jock could read Jean's face like print,
and in this stern toilet he foresaw a day of unrelenting house-
cleaning.
"Aye," he said to himself bitterly, "she's putting on her
Saturday face. There's trouble brewing, I doubt! It'll be Jock
this and Jock that both but and ben all day long, and whatever is
the use of all this tirley-wirly I can't see, when on Monday the
house will look as if it had never seen the sight of a besom!
I'll just bide where I am." He closed his eyes and pretended to
be asleep.
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