Christie (arms akimbo). “Me, impudent? how daur ye speak against my charackter, that's kenned for decency o' baith sides the Firrth.”
Beeny (contemptuously). “Oh, ye're sly enough to beguile the men, but we ken ye.”
Christie. “I'm no sly, and” (drawing near and hissing the words) “I'm no like the woman Jean an' I saw in Rose Street, dead drunk on the causeway, while her mon was working for her at sea. If ye're no ben your hoose in ae minute, I'll say that will gar Liston Carnie fling ye ower the pier-head, ye fool-moothed drunken leear—Scairt!”*
*A local word; a corruption from the French Sortez.
If my reader has seen and heard Mademoiselle Rachel utter her famous Sortez, in “Virginie,” he knows exactly with what a gesture and tone the Johnstone uttered this word.
Beeny (in a voice of whining surprise). “Hech! what a spite Flucker Johnstone's dochter has taen against us.”
Christie. “Scairt!”
Beeny (in a coaxing voice, and moving a step). “Aweel! what's a' your paession, my boenny woman?”
Christie. “Scairt!”
Beeny retired before the thunder and lightning of indignant virtue.