‘It is a most unlucky discovery,’ said Pitwinnoch.
‘And this threat of exposure,’ responded his client.
‘And my character brought into peril!’ exclaimed the lawyer.
‘Had you not rashly advised me,’ said Milrookit, ‘I should never for a moment have thought of retaining the property.’
‘Both your father and yourself, Sir,’ retorted the lawyer, ‘thought if it could be done, it ought; I but did my duty as your lawyer, in recommending what you so evidently wished.’
‘That is not the fact, Sir,’ replied Milrookit, sharply, and the conversation proceeded to become more abrupt and vehement, till the anger of high words assumed the form of action, and the lawyer and his client rushed like two bull-dogs on each other. At that crisis, the door was suddenly opened, and the old Leddy looking in, said,—
‘Shake him weel, Mr. Pitwinnoch, and if he’ll no conform, I redde ye gar him conform.’
The rage of the combatants was instantly extinguished, and they stood pale and confounded, trembling in every limb.
It had happened, after the Leddy returned home from Pitwinnoch’s, that Robina called, in the carriage, to effect, if possible, a reconciliation with her, which, for reasons we need not mention, her husband had engaged her that afternoon to do, and she had, in consequence, brought her, in the spirit of friendship, as she imagined, out to Kittlestonheugh. The Leddy, however, prided herself on being almost as dexterous a diplomatician as she was learned in the law, and she affected to receive her grand-daughter in the spirit of a total oblivion of all injuries.
‘Ye ken, Beenie, my dear,’ said she, ‘that I’m an aged person, and for a’ the few and evil days I hae before me in this howling wilderness, it’s vera natural that I should like to make a conciliation wi’ my grandchilder, who, I hope, will a’ live in comfort wi’ one another—every one getting his own right, for it’s a sore thing to go to law, although I hae some reason to know that there are folks in our family that ken mair o’ the nine points than they let wit—so I’m cordial glad to see you, Beenie, and I take it so kind, that if ye’ll gie me a hurl in the carriage, and send me hame at night, I’ll no object to gang wi’ you and speer for your gudeman, for whom I hae a’ manner o’ respek, even though he was a thought unreasonable anent my charge o’ moderation for the bed and board.’