‘A bonnie wife ye wud hae, Francie Gordon, wha, kennin her father duin ilk mortal thing for the love o’ his auld maister and comrade, tuik the fine chance to mak her ain o’ ’t, and haud her grip o’ the callan til hersel!—Think ye aither o’ the auld men ever mintit at sic a thing as fatherin baith? That my father had a lass-bairn o’ ’s ain shawed mair nor onything the trust your father pat in ’im! Francie, the verra grave wud cast me oot for shame ’at I sud ance hae thoucht o’ sic a thing! Man, it wud maist drive yer leddy-mither dementit!’
‘It’s my business, Kirsty, wha I merry!’
‘And I houp yer grace ’ll alloo it’s pairt my business wha ye sall not merry—and that’s me, Francie!’
Gordon sprang to his feet with such a look of wrath and despair as for a moment frightened Kirsty who was not easily frightened. She thought of the terrible bog-holes on the way her lover had come, sprang also to her feet, and caught him by the arm where, his foot already in the stirrup, he stood in the act of mounting.
‘Francie! Francie!’ she cried, ‘hearken to rizzon! There’s no a body, man or wuman, I like better nor yersel to du ye ony guid or turn o’ guid—’cep’ my father, of coorse, and my mither, and my ain Steenie!’
‘And hoo mony mair, gien I had the wull to hear the lang bible-chapter o’ them, and see mysel comin in at the tail o’ them a’, like the hin’most sheep, takin his bite as he cam? Na, na! it’s time I was hame, and had my slip (_pinafore_) on, and was astride o’ a stick! Gien ye had a score o’ idiot-brithers, ye wud care mair for ilk ane o’ them nor for me! I canna bide to think o’ ’t.’
‘It’s true a’ the same, whether ye can bide to think o’ ’t or no, Francie!’ returned the girl, her face, which had been very pale, now rosy with indignation. ‘My Steenie’s mair to me nor a’ the Gordons thegither, Bow-o’-meal or Jock-and-Tam as ye like!’
She drew back, sat down again to the stocking she was knitting for Steenie, and left her lover to mount and ride, which he did without another word.
‘There’s mair nor ae kin’ o’ idiot,’ she said to herself, ‘and Steenie’s no the kin’ that oucht to be ca’d ane. There’s mair in Steenie nor in sax Francie Gordons!’
If ever Kirsty came to love a man, it would be just nothing to her to die for him; but then it never would have been anything to her to die for her father or her mother or Steenie!