“‘If it gangs on much further,’ I tellt him, ‘I’ll bring oot the polis.’
“Wullie John was fair on the road for bein’ an A1 gladiator, but he went and dee’d on Duffy, and I never saw a man mair chawed.
“Duffy’s next was a laddie too—they ca’d him Alexander. There was gaun to be nane o’ their hardenin’ dydoes wi’ Alexander.
“It was aboot the time Duffy took to politics, and said the thing the Democratic pairty wanted was educated men wi’ brains. He made up his mind that Alexander wad never cairry a coal-poke, but get the best o’ learnin’ if it cost a pound.
“He wasna very strong, was Alexander, and Duffy fed him maist o’ the time on Gregory’s mixture, cod-ile, and ony ither stuff he could buy by word o’ mooth at the apothecary’s withoot a doctor’s line. Alexander was getting medicine poored into him that often he was feared to gant in case he wad jar his teeth on a table-spoon when his een was shut. He wore hot-water bottles to his feet in the deid o’ summer, and if he had a sair heid in the mornin’ afore he started for the school on the geography days he was put to his bed and fed on tapioca. Everything went wrang wi’ puir wee Alexander. The hives went in wi’ him, and the dregs o’ the measles cam’ oot. He took every trouble that was gaun aboot except gymnastics; Duffy took him to Professor Coats, the bump-man, and had his heid examined; the Professor said it was as fine a heid o’ its kind as ever he saw, and Duffy put a bawbee on the bag o’ coals richt aff, and began to put the money bye for Alexander’s college fees.
“Alexander’s a man nod, and daein’ fine. He’s in the gas office; the only time he went to college was to read the meter there.
“Ye canna tell whit laddies’ll turn oot, and it’s no’ ony better wi’ lassies. Duffy had a wheen o’ lassies; I forget hoo mony there was a’thegither, but when they were coortin’ ye wad think ye were gaim doon the middle o’ the Haymakers’ country dance when ye cam’ up the close at nicht.
“The auldest—she was Annie—was naething particular fancy; she jist nursed the rest, and made their peenies, and washed for them, and trimmed her ain hats, and made Duffy’s auld waistcoats into suits for the wee yins, and never got to the dancin’, so naebody merried her, and she’s there yet.
“A’ the chaps cam’ efter her sisters.
“The sisters never let on aboot the coal-ree and Duffy’s lorry, but said their paw was in the coal tred—a kind o’ a coal-maister. It was a bonny sicht to see them merchin’ oot to their cookery lessons in the efternoons, their hair as curly’s onything, and their beds no’ made.