“Hoot, man! tak yer tongue i’ yer teeth; it’ll be mair to the purpose,” cried the laird laughing, for he had got over his ill humour already. “My life i’ my han’, quo’ he!—Man, I haena carriet a dirk this mony a day! I laid it aff wi’ the kilt.”
“Weel, it micht be the better ’at ye hadna, gien ye binna gaein hame afore nicht, for I saw some cairds o’ the ro’d the day.—Ance mair, gien ye wad but hearken til ane ’at confesses he oucht to ken, even sud he be i’ the wrang, I tell ye that horsie is not siller—na, nor naething like it.”
“Plague take the man!—what is it, then?” cried the laird.
“What for didna ye speir that at me afore?” rejoined Jeames. “It wad hae gien me leeberty to tell ye—to the best o’ my abeelity that is. Whan I’m no cocksure—an’ its ower muckle a thing to be cocksure aboot—I wadna volunteer onything. I wadna say naething till I was adjured like an evil speerit.”
“Weel,” quoth the laird, entering now into the humour of the thing, “herewith I adjure thee, thou contrairy and inarticulate speerit, that thou tell me whereof and of what substance this same toy-horse is composed, manufactured, or made up.”
“Toy here, toy there!” returned Jeames; “sae far as ony cawpabeelity o’ mine, or ony puir skeel I hae, will alloo o’ testimony—though min’ ye, laird, I winna tak the consequences o’ bein’ i’ the wrang—though I wad raither tak them, an’ ower again, nor be i’ the wrang,—”
The laird turned and went out, followed by Cosmo. He began to think the man must have lost his reason. But when the watchmaker saw them walking steadily along the street in the direction of home, he darted out of the door and ran after them.
“Gien ye wad gang, laird,” he said, in an injured tone, “ye mecht hae jist latten me en’ the sentence I had begun!”
“There’s nae en’ to ony o’ yer sentences, man!” said the laird; “that’s the only thing i’ them ’at was forgotten, ’cep’ it was the sense.”
“Weel, guid day to ye laird!” returned Jeames. “Only,” he added, drawing a step nearer, and speaking in a subdued confidential voice, “dinna lat yer harsie rin awa’ upo’ the ro’d hame, for I sweir til ye, gien there be only trowth i’ the laws o’ natur, he’s no siller, nor onything like it—”