We took horse early, and passed first by the house of Shaws, where
it stood smokeless in a great field of white frost, for it was yet
early in the day. Here Prestongrange alighted down, gave me his
horse, an proceeded alone to visit my uncle. My heart, I remember,
swelled up bitter within me at the sight of that bare house and the
thought of the old miser sitting chittering within in the cold
kitchen!
"There is my home," said I; "and my family."
"Poor David Balfour!" said Miss Grant.
What passed during the visit I have never heard; but it would
doubtless not be very agreeable to Ebenezer, for when the Advocate
came forth again his face was dark.
"I think you will soon be the laird indeed, Mr. Davie," says he,
turning half about with the one foot in the stirrup.
"I will never pretend sorrow," said I; and, to say the truth,
during his absence Miss Grant and I had been embellishing the place
in fancy with plantations, parterres, and a terrace--much as I have
since carried out in fact.
Thence we pushed to the Queensferry, where Rankeillor gave us a
good welcome, being indeed out of the body to receive so great a
visitor. Here the Advocate was so unaffectedly good as to go quite
fully over my affairs, sitting perhaps two hours with the Writer in
his study, and expressing (I was told) a great esteem for myself
and concern for my fortunes. To while this time, Miss Grant and I
and young Rankeillor took boat and passed the Hope to Limekilns.
Rankeillor made himself very ridiculous (and, I thought, offensive)
with his admiration for the young lady, and to my wonder (only it
is so common a weakness of her sex) she seemed, if anything, to be
a little gratified. One use it had: for when we were come to the
other side, she laid her commands on him to mind the boat, while
she and I passed a little further to the alehouse. This was her
own thought, for she had been taken with my account of Alison
Hastie, and desired to see the lass herself. We found her once
more alone--indeed, I believe her father wrought all day in the
fields--and she curtsied dutifully to the gentry-folk and the
beautiful young lady in the riding-coat.
"Is this all the welcome I am to get?" said I, holding out my hand.
"And have you no more memory of old friends?"
"Keep me! wha's this of it?" she cried, and then, "God's truth,
it's the tautit {19} laddie!"
"The very same," says
"Mony's the time I've thocht upon you and your freen, and blythe am
I to see in your braws," {20} she cried. "Though I kent ye were
come to your ain folk by the grand present that ye sent me and that
I thank ye for with a' my heart."
"There," said Miss Grant to me, "run out by with ye, like a guid
bairn. I didnae come here to stand and haud a candle; it's her and
me that are to crack."
I suppose she stayed ten minutes in the house, but when she came
forth I observed two things--that her eyes were reddened, and a
silver brooch was gone out of her bosom. This very much affected
me.
"I never saw you so well adorned," said I.
"O Davie man, dinna be a pompous gowk!" said she, and was more than
usually sharp to me the remainder of the day.
About candlelight we came home from this excursion.
For a good while I heard nothing further of Catriona--my Miss Grant
remaining quite impenetrable, and stopping my mouth with
pleasantries. At last, one day that she returned from walking and
found me alone in the parlour over my French, I thought there was
something unusual in her looks; the colour heightened, the eyes
sparkling high, and a bit of a smile continually bitten in as she
regarded me. She seemed indeed like the very spirit of mischief,
and, walking briskly in the room, had soon involved me in a kind of
quarrel over nothing and (at the least) with nothing intended on my
side. I was like Christian in the slough--the more I tried to
clamber out upon the side, the deeper I became involved; until at
last I heard her declare, with a great deal of passion, that she
would take that answer from the hands of none, and I must down upon
my knees for pardon.