"Before him stood London John bearing the seductive advertisement."
"Hurrah for the Bailie! Come awa' man, quick, else yir shop will be wreckit. Where ha' ye been? The folk are cryin' oot for ye. It's time ye started on the tea and the whisky. Make way for the Bailie. He's coming to start the auction. Three cheers for Bailie MacConachie!" And the Bailie, limp and dishevelled, amazed and furious, was hustled through the crowd to see the Italian warehouse guarded by the police, and the mob of Muirtown clamouring for tea and whisky at his hand, while face to face with him stood London John, who had now been produced for the occasion, bearing on his back and breast the seductive advertisement.
"It's a brazen lie!" And the enraged Bailie lost all self-control as he read the legend on the board. "A low, mean, dirty trick, a deliberately planned fraud. It's perfectly iniquitous, in fact, juist—juist damnable! Bankrupt—who is bankrupt? Is't me?" And the veins on the Bailie's neck swelled visibly. "Tea at elevenpence-halfpenny! I never had such trash in my shop. Three shillings is the lowest, and I never recommended it. Whisky!—there is not a drop in the shop. Who dare say I would turn this shop into a public-house? I'll be at the bottom of this, though it cost me a thousand pounds. Who hired ye to carry round the board, ye peetiful creature? If ye don't tell the truth I'll commit ye to gaol this very meenute." And the Bailie turned the battery of his wrath upon London John, who was greatly flattered by his own prominent position, and not at all concerned about the Bailie's threat.
"It was," replied the Mercury of the Vennel, with great composure, "a big, stout man like yirsel', Bailie, that gied me the boards and a shillin'; or, noo that I think about it, he wasna so big, he was a little man, and gey shilpit (thin) about the neck. Dod! I'm no very sure, though, but that it was a woman wi' a red face and a shepherd's tartan plaid; at ony rate, if it wasna her it micht be a bit lassie wi' bare head and feet; and I'm thinkin' noo, Bailie, it was a bit lassikie, for she said to me, 'Have ye ever been in London?' Noo, Bailie, I would like to tell you about London." And if the police had not silenced London John, the Bailie at that moment would have had a fit of apoplexy, for it was evident that the trail was blind and there was no getting to the real person behind London John.
The crowd had listened with considerable patience and self-restraint to this conversation, but as soon as the hope of tea and refreshment died away, and they realised that some one had fooled them, they looked out for a victim, and settled upon the Bailie.
"Ye should be ashamed of yourself," and Tinkler Tam, standing out from the midst of the crowd, and sitting as it were upon the bench sentenced the Bailie in the dock. "It's a fine business to be playing tricks on the poor folk o' Muirtown, wilin' them from their work to waste their time at your shop-door and sendin' them awa' empty-handed. If it had been the first o' April, and ye had been a laddie, I wouldna hev said much aboot it; but at your age, and you a magistrate, to play sic a trick, it's perfectly disgraceful. Ye ought to get a month's hard labour, but aye thing's sure, ye'll no long be a Bailie o' Muirtown. It was fearsome to hear ye askin' London John who gave him the shillin' when he describit ye juist as ye are standing; then the puir body, when ye threatened him, brought in the lassie. Man, though ye're a Bailie and I'm naething but Tinkler Tam, I would scorn to make use of a poor natural that hasna his wits, juist to feed my vanity and gither a crowd round my shop." Then the crowd united in three long groans, and possibly might have shown their indignation in a still more pronounced form, but the police, being still further reinforced, drove them along the streets, while the Bailie hid himself in the recesses of his shop.
Three minutes later Speug sauntered into the shop with Howieson and Bauldie, and demanded a pennyworth of peppermint drops. He also remarked to Jock, as they were being folded up, "If there be as mony o' the Bailie's friends callin' at the shop on Monday, I doubt the police will no be able to spare a constable to keep order on the Terrace." And as a matter of fact the offensive patrol was withdrawn, and the Seminary resumed possession of the debatable ground.