"I don't know what he meant, nor do I know whether he used those words. Probably he did not; and you mistook him as you have mistaken me. But I am really tired of being so cross-questioned, Rose. Look me in the face, and tell me whether you really believe me to be guilty or not?" he said, in his most frank and persuasive manner.
"Na, na, I canna believe ony ill o' ye, Johnnie Scott," replied the girl.
And, in fact, the man had such magnetic power over her that he could make her believe anything that he wished.
"Now let us look into this satchel," he said, proceeding to open it.
He took out the bags of money.
"There is one bag gone! fifty pounds gone!" he exclaimed.
"Na, that canna be, gin it was in the bag. I hanna opened it ance," said the girl, unhesitatingly.
The man paid no attention to her words, but took out the jewels and began to examine them.
"Confound it! The watch and chain are gone, and the solitaire diamond ring is gone, and—" here the man broke out into a volley of curses forcible enough to right a ship in a storm, and said: "The jewel snuff-box, worth ten times all the other jewels put together, is gone! How is this, Rose?"
"I dinna ken. How suld I ken? I took the bag frae your hands, and I put it back intil your hands, e'en just as I took it, without ever once seeing the inside o' it," boldly replied the girl.