I tried to speak, but I couldn’t. I merely gulped. And Whinnie’s rough hand pushed me back into my chair.
“Dinna greet,” he said, with two tears creeping crookedly down his own seamed and wind-roughened face.
But I continued to gulp.
“Dinna greet, for your laddie’s safe and sound!” I heard the rapt voice saying.
I could hear what he’d said, quite distinctly, yet his words seemed without color, without meaning, without sense.
“Have you found him?” called out Lady Alicia sharply.
“Aye, he’s found,” said Whinnie, with an exultant gulp of his own, but without so much as turning to look at that other woman, who, apparently, was of small concern to him. His eyes were on me, and he was very intimately patting my leg, without quite knowing it.
“He says that the child’s been found,” interpreted Lady Alicia, obviously disturbed by the expression on my face.
“He’s just yon, as warm and safe as a bird in a nest,” further expounded Whinstane Sandy.
“Where?” demanded Lady Alicia. But Whinnie ignored her.