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"I have to go down now an' see if I can get Judy to come help to-morrow. Do you think you can undress yo'self to-night?" "Of co'se," answered the Little Colonel. Mom Beck was in such a hurry to be off that she did not notice the tremble in the voice that answered her. "Well, the can'le is lit in yo' room. So run along now like a nice little lady, an' don't bothah yo' mamma.
Come in." "I dinna ken whaur I'm gaein." "Never min' that. Come straucht foret. I'm watchin' ye." Whan God tells ye to gang into the mirk, gang!" "But I dinna like the mirk," said Annie. "No human sowl can," responded Thomas. "Jean, fess a can'le direckly."
He turned an' gaed his ways oot o' that room, and lockit the door ahint him; and step by step, doon the stairs, as heavy as leed; and set doon the can'le on the table at the stairfoot. He couldnae pray, he couldnae think, he was dreepin' wi' caul' swat, an' naething could he hear but the dunt-dunt-duntin' o' his ain heart.
But there was naethin' to be heard, neither inside the manse nor in a' Ba'weary parish, an' naethin' to be seen but the muckle shadows turnin' round the can'le. An' then a' at aince, the minister's heart played dunt an' stood stock-still; an' a cauld wund blew amang the hairs o' his heid. Whaten a weary sicht was that for the puir man's een!
It was aye pit-mirk; the flame o' the can'le, when he set it on the grund, brunt steedy and clear as in a room; naething moved, but the Dule Water seepin' and sabbin' doon the glen, an' yon unhaly footstep that cam' plodding' doun the stairs inside the manse. He kenned the foot ower-weel, for it was Janet's; and at ilka step that cam' a wee thing nearer, the cauld got deeper in his vitals.
But they didn't, for they'd putten out the lantern in the stable, and I'd brought the can'le up wi' me into the cham'er. I heerd 'em stumbling about i' the kitchen, and then they came up to bed, and Mike began talking to me about the lambs i' the croft, and I knew he'd niver set een on the ash-riddling.
Gaen to the kirk at nicht was something to mind aboot. There wasna a lamp to be seen an' sic roads! The very laddies frae the Sabbath Schule were gaen on the paidmint, whaur there were maist gutters, an' skowf kickin' them at ane anither. The middle o' the road cudna haud the can'le to the paidmints for glaur lest Sabbath.
Meg was throo seein' her fowk no' that lang syne, an' she wud hae me to promise to come throo wi' Sandy an' see them. She wudna hae a na-say. She was aye an awfu' tague for tonguein', Meg. I mind when she was but ten 'ear auld, me, that was saxteen or seventeen 'ear aulder, cudna haud the can'le till her. She was a gabbin' little taed.
Then the ol' home kotched afire an' then me'n Miss Ann didn't have no sho' 'nough home an' we got ter visitin' roun' an' Marse Bob, yo' gran'pap, kep a pleadin' an' Miss Ann she kep' a visitin', fust one place then anudder, an' Marse Bob he got kinder tired a followin' aroun' takin' our dus' an' befo' you knowd it he done tramsfered his infections ter yo' gran'mammy, an' a nice lady she wa', but can't none er them hol' a can'le ter my Miss Ann, then or now 'cept'n maybe that purty red-headed gal what goes a whizzin' aroun' the county an' don't drap her eyes fer nobody.
"Aggie, I wadna willinl'y say a word to vex ye," answered Cosmo; "but I hae notit an h'ard 'at the best 'o wuman whiles tak oonaccootable fancies to men no fit to haud a can'le to them." Aggie turned her head aside. "I wad ill like you, for instance, to be drawn to yon Crawford," he went on. "It's eneuch to me 'at he's been lang the factotum o' an ill man."
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