“Auld friend,” he said abruptly, with that harsh tremor in his voice, more moving than many lamentations, “ken ye onything that concerns me or mine? tell me plain out what it is, for this I wunna bear.”
“Oh, Saunders,” exclaimed the old woman, wiping the tears from her withered cheek, “have pity upon the lad—the puir lad!”
“Is that a’? have ye nae mair to say but that?” said Saunders. Janet had followed the example of the fisherman, and the two old servants of Mossgray were alone. “Is that a’?” repeated Saunders, speaking rapidly, as if, in the contradictory impulse of his anxiety, he wished to prevent her from answering. “Ye’re sure that’s a’? Then I maun gang my ways—I maun tak counsel; if it’s righteous it maunna be ower late; but I’ll no’ speak to the Laird. He’s no’ a man like me; he taks the reprobate and the race o’ the reprobate into his bosom. Na, I winna speak to the Laird.”
And lifting his head again with something of his usual rigid pride, the old man went away, as hastily as he had entered.
The market was over in Fendie, and as the summer afternoon drowsily waned, and the weekly stir subsided, Mr Oswald sat in his little private office alone. The banker was an elder of the Church, and a man, as Saunders thought, of kindred mind and temperament to his own. It was from him that he came to seek counsel.
Mr Oswald looked up in some astonishment as the old man was ushered into his sanctum.
“It’s a case of conscience, Sir,” said Saunders, in his harsh, tremulous voice. “I was wanting to ask your counsel.”
Mr Oswald was a little startled. Cases of conscience were not quite in his way, although he had the ordination of the eldership upon him.
“Had you not better speak to the minister, Saunders?” he said; “but sit down, and tell me what troubles you.”
The banker’s heart was touched with the trembling vehemence of the old man’s manner and appearance as he stood before him.