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"Harkee, Dandy," said he, not in the slightest degree displeased with him, although he affected to be so, "if you wish to remain in my service keep the secret of Miss Gourlay's residence a secret not only from me, but from every human being that lives. You have taken a most unwarrantable and impudent liberty in following her as you did.
"We're needing some hay for the burgh horse," said the Provost. "Ye'll be willing to sell at fifty shillings the ton, since it's like to be so plentiful." "Oh," said Tam solemnly, "that's on-possible! Gourlay's seeking the three pound! and where he leads we maun a' gang. Gourlay sets the tune, and Barbie dances till't." That was quite untrue so far as the speaker was concerned.
Gourlay's house was a material expression of that delight, stood for it in stone and lime. It was not that he reasoned deliberately when he built the house. But every improvement that he made and he was always spending money on improvements had for its secret motive a more or less vague desire to score off his rivals.
He started violently that warmth on his cheek brought the terror so near. The heavens were rent with a crash, and the earth seemed on fire. Gourlay screamed in terror. The baker put his arm round him in kindly protection. "Tuts, man, dinna be feared," he said. "You're John Gourlay's son, ye know. You ought to be a hardy man." "Ay, but I'm no," chattered John, the truth coming out in his fear.
At last the man, laying his "boax" on the ground, stood up to ease his spine, so that his face was visible. "Losh, it's Jock Gilmour, the orra man at Gourlay's! What'll he be doing out on the street at this hour of the day? I thocht he was always busy on the premises! Will Gourlay be sending him off with something to somebody? But no; that canna be. He would have sent it with the carts."
Next morning Postie came clattering through the paved yard in his tackety boots, and handed in a blue envelope at the back door with a business-like air, his ferrety eyes searching Mrs. Gourlay's face as she took the letter from his hand. But she betrayed nothing to his curiosity, since she knew nothing of her husband's affairs, and had no fear, therefore, of what the letter might portend.
God, you've been making a name up in Embro. I hear you stood up till him gey weel," and he winked openly to those around. Young Gourlay's maddened nature broke at the insult. "Damn you," he screamed, "leave me alone, will you? I have done nothing to you, have I?" Brodie stared at him across his suspended whisky glass, an easy and assured contempt curling his lip.
He represents him as "writhing in agony at the self same hour," and as dying on the same day when he, Mr. Gourlay, crossed over into the United States. Statistical Account, vol. 2, p. 401. He was astray by exactly a week. By reference to the precept of the court, I find that Mr. Gourlay's trial took place on the day specified in the text Friday, the 20th of August.
It was his son's conduct that gave Gourlay's enemies their first opportunity against him, that enabled them to turn the tables. They might sneer at his trollop of a wife, they might sneer at his want of mere cleverness; still he held his head high amongst them. They might suspect his poverty; but so far, for anything they knew, he might have thousands behind him. He owed not a man in Barbie.
"'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. "'And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing." Mrs. Gourlay's manner had changed: she was in the high exaltation of madness.
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