“Ay, he’s deid: maybe that’s
what ‘ll be troublin’ yer sicht, daddy.”
“No, my son. Ta maad lairt was not fery
maad, and if he was maad he was not paad, and it was
not to ta plame of him; he wass coot always however.”
“He was that, daddy.”
“But it will pe something fery paad, and it
will pe troubling her speerit. When she’ll
pe take ta pipes, to pe amusing herself, and will
plow Till an crodh a’ Dhonnachaidh (Turn the
cows, Duncan), out will pe come Cumhadh an fhir mhoir
(The Lament of the Big Man). All is not well,
my son.”
“Weel, dinna distress yersel’, daddy.
Lat come what wull come. Foreseein’ ‘s
no forefen’in’. Ye ken yersel’
’at mony ’s the time the seer has broucht
the thing on by tryin’ to haud it aff.”
“It will pe true, my son. Put it would
aalways haf come.”
“Nae doobt; sae ye jist come in wi’ me,
daddy, an’ sit doon by the ha’ fire, an’
I ’ll come to ye as sune ’s I’ve
been to see ’at the maister disna want me.
But ye’ll better come up wi’ me to my room
first,” he went on, “for the maister disna
like to see me in onything but the kilt.”
“And why will he no pe in ta kilts aal as now?”
“I hae been ridin’, ye ken, daddy, an’
the trews fits the saiddle better nor the kilts.”
“She’ll not pe knowing tat. Old Allister,
your creat—her own crandfather, was ta
pest horseman ta worrlt efer saw, and he ’ll
nefer pe hafing ta trews to his own lecks nor ta saddle
to his horse’s pack. He ’ll chust
make his men pe strap on an old plaid, and he ’ll
pe kive a chump, and away they wass, horse and man,
one peast, aal two of tem poth together.”
Thus chatting they went to the stable, and from the
stable to the house, where they met no one, and went
straight up to Malcolm’s room—the
old man making as little of the long ascent as Malcolm
himself.
Brooding, if a man of his temperament may ever be
said to brood, over the sad history of his young wife
and the prospects of his daughter, the marquis rode
over fields and through gates—he never
had been one to jump a fence in cold blood—till
the darkness began to fall; and the bearings of his
perplexed position came plainly before him.
First of all, Malcolm acknowledged, and the date of
his mother’s death known, what would Florimel
be in the eyes of the world? Supposing the world
deceived by the statement that his mother died when
he was born, where yet was the future he had marked
out for her? He had no money to leave her, and
she must be helplessly dependent on her brother.
Malcolm, on the other hand, might make a good match,
or, with the advantages he could secure him, in the
army, still better in the navy, well enough push his
way in the world.
