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He was not a Catholic, but he had shown such distress when Robina had told him to sit at home with her mother that they were forced to let him go to church to keep him quiet. On further acquaintance, Bildy did not belie the good character given him by the Inspector. He was merely a grown-up child.
It would have been amusing were it not so sad. I could never extract a word from him on such occasions, so overawed was he! From the first, while looking upon Robina as the supreme authority to which he owed implicit obedience, Bildy seemed to give all his affection to the old widow.
The diminutive, in Bildy's phraseology, implied depreciation; that was why he stigmatized a regular six-footer as a "monnie." When Doddy came to Ardmuirland, Bildy discovered his real vocation! Doddy or, in English, Georgie was the orphan child of Robina's sister.
Father Fleming!" repeated Bildy over and over again, as though to familiarize himself with the sound of it. "Aye, aye! He's the boy! He can gab, canna' he? He's the boy to tell us what to dee!" he continued in his broad Scots. "It's extraordinary how well he behaves at Mass or at any rate during the sermon," said Val when he heard the story. "I wish some others were as good!"
Suddenly, while he looked on, Doddy disappeared, and a shout of terror arose from the other boys, who were too full of fear to do much toward helping the unfortunate child, though one or two slid down prostrate and tried to crawl to the hole into which Doddy had fallen, in order to help him out with their sticks. It remained for Bildy to come to their assistance.
Not only did he carry on familiar conversations with her, on his part, but it appeared that the cow made him her confidant in return. If he began to murmur something to himself as he sat by the chimney corner, they would inquire what he was talking about. It was generally arrant nonsense that he told them. Once Robina asked: "Wha tellit ye that rubbish, Bildy?" "The coo," he gravely answered.
As long as they kept near to the place upon which they had first set foot all was well; but security made them venturesome. They started a game of shinty, and threw themselves into the sport with fervor. Bildy, partly hidden behind the bushes which skirted the water, watched the game with interest, his eyes on his beloved Doddy.
But the answer was not that which they took a simple pleasure in drawing from him usually. Bildy began to bite his hand a trick he had when annoyed. "That's nae preachin'," he cried indignantly. "Yon monnie canna' preach! Wha's the reason Father Fleming canna' preach the day? Eh!"
"Ye havna' fetched oot the coo!" she exclaimed. "Gae in an' drive her oot, Bildy!" "Na, na," replied he, solemnly shaking his head. "She says it's ower cauld the day. She'll bide inside." Bildy's hero-worship of my brother increased as time went by. He regularly came to Mass, and obedient to Robina's instructions sat still and looked "straicht at Father Fleming." This did not suit Bildy at all.
With a frightened cry the man rushed over the ice to the spot, and regardless of the cautions which the others shrilled at him, plunged into the water. Doddy had fallen in where there was only very thin ice around the edge of an open sheet of water. Luckily, it was shallow for a man, though it covered the child. Bildy managed to seize the boy and rose up gasping from the pool, holding Doddy aloft.
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