'I'll murder the auld—.' The epithet he ended with is too ugly to write.
'Daur to say sic a word in ae breath wi' my grannie,' cried Robert, snatching up the lapstone, 'an' I'll brain ye upo' yer ain shop-flure.'
Sandy threw the knife on his stool, and sat down beside it. Robert dropped the lapstone. Sandy took it up and burst into tears, which before they were half down his face, turned into tar with the blackness of the same.
'I'm an awfu' sinner,' he said, 'and vengeance has owerta'en me. Gang oot o' my chop! I wasna worthy o' her. Gang oot, I say, or I'll kill ye.'
Robert went. Close by the door he met Miss St. John. He pulled off his cap, and would have passed her. But she stopped him.
'I am going for a walk a little way,' she said. 'Will you go with me?'
She had come out in the hope of finding him, for she had seen him go up the street.
'That I wull,' returned Robert, and they walked on together.
When they were beyond the last house, Miss St. John said,
'Would you like to play on the piano, Robert?'