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What was he saying then?" The men smiled at her incoherent earnestness, but the lady, with true feminine condescension, informed her, in a loud voice, that Allan had an engagement in Scotland on St. Lawrence's Eve. She then started up, extended her shrivelled hands, that shook like the aspen, and panted out: "Aih, aih? Lord preserve us! Whaten an engagement has he on St. Lawrence's Eve?
Into that on her right Miss Horn now re-entered, to rejoin Mrs Mellis, the wife of the principal draper in the town, who had called ostensibly to condole with her, but really to see the corpse. "Aih! she was taen yoong!" sighed the visitor, with long drawn tones and a shake of the head, implying that therein lay ground of complaint, at which poor mortals dared but hint.
Aih, Francie, I doobt something a heap waur 'll hae to come upo' ye! A' my labour's lost, and I dearly grudge it no the labour, but the loss o' 't! I grudge that sair. 'Kirsty, i' the name o' God, wha is my neebour? 'Yer ain mither. 'My ain mither! her oot o' a' the warl'? I never cam upo' spark o' rizzon intil her!
"You are extremely audacious and impertinent, John; but the language of reprobation cannot affect me: I came only to ask you one question, which I desire you to answer candidly. Did you ever say to anyone that I was the boy Robert's natural father?" "Hout na, sir! Ha-ha-ha! Aih, fie, na, sir! I durst-na say that for my life.
"The lodge of a chief!" the girl continued in a low, bitter voice. "What is the lodge of a chief? A smoky fire, a pot, a bed of skins, aih- yi!
I did cry till 'im, I min' weel, but it was my reelin' brain an' no my trustin' hert 'at cried. Aih me! I doobt gien the Lord war to come to me noo, he wadna fin' muckle faith i' my pairt o' the yerth. Aih! I wad like to lat him see something like lippenin'! I wad fain trust him till his hert's content. But I doobt it's only speeritual ambeetion, or better wad hae come o' 't by this time.
"Aih! but she was a patient cratur wi' a' flesh," persisted Mrs Mellis, as if she would not willingly be foiled in the attempt to extort for the dead some syllable of acknowledgment from the lips of her late companion. "'Deed she was that! a wheen ower patient wi' some. But that cam' o' haein mair hert nor brains. She had feelin's gien ye like and to spare. But I never took ower ony o' the stock.
But chancing to hear him say something about the 9th of August, she quitted reading, turned round her head to listen, and then asked, in a hoarse, tremulous voice: "What's that he's saying? What's the unlucky callant saying about the 9th of August? Aih? To be sure it is St. Lawrence's Eve, although the 10th be his day. It's ower true, ower true, ower true for him an' a' his kin, poor man! Aih?
Miss Horn, who had followed her to the head of the stair, watched her out of sight below the landing, when she turned and walked back once more into the parlour, but with a lingering look towards the opposite room, as if she saw through the closed door what lay white on the white bed. "It's a God's mercy I hae no feelin's," she said to herself. Aih, puir Grizel!
But aih! he likes to hear the sea moanin', an' watch the stars sheenin'! There's a sicht o' oondevelopit releegion in him, as Maister Graham says; an' I du not believe 'at the Lord 'll see him wranged mair nor 's for 's guid. But it's my belief, gien ye took the leeberty frae the puir cratur, ye wad kill him." "Then you won't help me!" she cried despairingly.
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