CHAPTER XI.
When I got home, and was comfortably seated in my arm-chair by the fire, Betty came in to set my tea, and I wasn't long in noticing that, from her abstracted air and the listless way she was moving about, she had something on her mind. She looked for a moment or two at Bang and Jip lying comfortably curled up on the hearthrug. 'Thae dugs are braw an' snug lyin' there,' she said; 'an' my puir Jessie's sittin' in the cauld stick-hoose in the huff. No' that I grudge them their warm bed, for I'm gled—he'rt gled—to see them peaceable at last wi' yin anither. It's nae time since they were girnin' an' fechtin' an' tumblin' ower each ither frae the Cross to the Gill, an' noo, haith, they canna get ower cheek-for-chowie. Ye maun ha'e a wonderfu' wey wi' dugs, Maister Weelum. It's a peety ye couldna exert it in ither weys.'
I know Betty too well to venture assistance, and I had the feeling that she would soon work her way round to her subject without my aiding and abetting.
'The kettle will soon be through the boil, an' ye'll get your tea in a jiffy,' she said. 'Imphm! it's a gey comfortable-lookin' chair, that yin opposite ye, Maister Weelum; an', d'ye ken, I met a leddy the day that I wad like to see sittin' in it.'
'Indeed, Betty!'
'Ay. I dinna ken when I was sae much impressed wi' onybody at first sicht as I was this day; an' when I was sittin' lookin' at her, an' listenin' to her voice, something whispered in my ear, "That's the wife for my boy."'
'My goodness, Betty, you're forcing the pace!' I laughingly said. 'First you wish to see this lady sitting in my chair, and in your next breath you say you wish to see her my wife! Where did you meet this paragon?'
'Weel, this efternoon, when you an' the dugs were away yer walk, I slippit in next door juist for a meenit to see hoo they were a' gettin' on, an', as I usually do, I opened the door withoot knockin' an' walked strecht ben to the kitchen, an' there, Maister Weelum, sittin' on the wee laich nursin'-chair at the fireside, was the leddy I speak o'. I gaed to gang back into the lobby; but Mrs Jardine wadna hear o't, an' she made me step in, an' she introduced me, quite the thing, mind you. Ye see, Tom's wife was toon bred, an' she kens a' the weys o't, an' she mentioned me by name an' the leddy by name; an' if she had been staunin' in a drawin'-room on a Turkey carpet, an' cled in brocade, she couldna ha'e dune it better. I juist didna catch the leddy's name, for, what wi' the suddenness, her bonny face, an' ae thing an' anither, I was sairly flabbergasted an' putten aboot. It seems, hooever, that she's in the picter-pentin' line, an' she's ta'en a great fancy to wee Isobel, an' she's makin' a portrait o' her. A week or twae bygane she saw the wee lass staunin' at the door as she was passin', an' she was so struck wi' her bonny wee face an' her lang fair hair that she spoke to her an' asked to see her mither. Weel, the upshot o' this was that, as I've said, she is pentin' her, an' a capital picter she's makin'. It's hardly finished yet. I ken fules an' bairns should never see hauf-dune wark, an' I'm no' a judge, into the bargain; but I'll say this, photographin' micht be quicker an' mair o' a deid likeness, but it's no' in it wi' yon for naturalness and bonny life-like colour. But that's by the wey, as it were. Her work is guid, withoot a doot, but she hersel's a perfect picter.'
I felt my heart beginning to thump and throb, and my breath getting catchy. 'Pity you missed her name, Betty,' I said with forced unconcern.
'Ay, as I telt ye, I was putten aboot, an' missed it; but I'll speir at Mrs Jardine again, 'at will I.'