Page:Ralph Connor - The man from Glengarry.djvu/67

  "Night-shirt! and indeed, he has not such a thing to his name." Kirsty's tone betrayed her thankfulness that her brother was free from the effeminacy of a night-shirt; but noting the dismay and confusion on Mrs. Murray's face, she suggested, hesitatingly, "He might have one of my own, but I am thinking it will be small for him across the back."

"I am afraid so, Kirsty," said the minister's wife, struggling hard with a smile. "We will just use one of his own white shirts." But this scandalized Kirsty as an unnecessary and wasteful luxury. "Indeed, there is plenty of them in the chist, but he will be keeping them for the communion season, and the funerals, and such. He will not be wearing them in his bed, for no one will be seeing him there at all."

But he will feel so much better," said Mrs. Murray, and her smile was so sweet and winning that Kirsty's opposition collapsed, and without more words both sheets and shirt were produced.

As Kirsty laid them out she observed with a sigh: "Aye, aye, she was the clever woman—the wife, I mean. She was good with the needle, and indeed, at anything she tried to do."

"I did not know her," said Mrs. Murray, softly, "but every one tells me she was a good housekeeper and a good woman."

"She was that," said Kirsty, emphatically, "and she was the light of his eyes, and it was a bad day for Hugh when she went away."

"Now, Kirsty," said Mrs. Murray, after a pause,