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By the merest chance she had run up to the flat at her midday hour, to ask a question about Sir Edwin Crathie. and a rumour concerning him that she felt an imperative need to have answered. When she saw Lorraine in tears the question was instantly banished for the moment.
O Lord!" spoke the youth, breaking out into almost involuntary prayer, "help this man to haud troth wi' Thee! An' noo, Maister Crathie," he resumed, "I'm yer servan', ready to du onything I can. Forgi'e me, sir, for layin' on ower sair." "I forgi'e ye wi' a' my hert," returned the factor, inly delighted to have something to forgive.
How he himself managed to live in those first days without company what he thought about or speculated upon, it were hard to say. All he could be said to do was to ride here and there over the estate with his steward, Mr Crathie, knowing little and caring less about farming, or crops, or cattle.
"Gien I was to turn the order the ither gait, wad they min' you or me, div ye think, Maister Crathie?" "Give me that key, and go about your business." "Na, na, sir! What my lord gae me I s' keep for a' the factors atween this an' the Land's En'," returned Malcolm. "An' for lea'in' the place, gien I be na in your service, Maister Crathie, I'm nae un'er your orders. I'll gang whan it shuits me.
Imagine a scowl on one of Raphael's cherubim." "I don't want to imagine anything so silly, and I'm not in the least like a cherub. It would be more sensible if you want to do some wise imagining, to think of Sir Edwin Crathie, and imagine yourself in the devil's clutches."
"I am glad indeed to see you, Mr. Crathie," he said, "but I fear you are out too soon." "I am quite well since yesterday, my lord," returned the factor, his face shining with pleasure. "Your lordship's accession has made a young man of me again. Here I am to render account of my stewardship." "I want none, Mr. Crathie nothing, that is, beyond a summary statement of how things stand with me."
Mr Crathie, knowing himself now in the wrong, was a little frightened at the set speech, and began to bluster and stammer, but the swift descent of Malcolm's heavy riding whip on his shoulders and back made him voluble in curses. Then began a battle that could not last long with such odds on the side of justice.
Then she turned to Lizzy and thanked her for her kindness, and they parted Lizzy to her baby, and Clementina to yet a dream or two. Long before her dreams were sleeping ones, however, Malcolm was out in the bay in the Psyche's dinghy, catching mackerel: some should be for his grandfather, some for Miss Horn, some for Mrs Courthope, and some for Mrs Crathie.
He wrote to Mr Crathie, who till then had heard nothing of the business; and the news increased both his discontent with his superiors, and his wrath with those whom he had come to regard as his rebellious subjects. The stiff necked people of the Bible was to him always now, as often he heard the words, the people of Scaurnose and the Seaton of Portlossie.
I know you. What right have you to be on the premises? Didn't I send you about your business this morning?" "Ay, sir, but ye didna pay me my wages," said Malcolm, who had sprung to the door and now stood holding it half shut, while Mr Crathie pushed it half open. "No matter. You're nothing better than a housebreaker if you enter any building about the place." "I brak nae lock," returned Malcolm.
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