My words seemed to disarm her of any suspicion she might have had about me, and she busied herself stirring the peat fire.
Its warmth and the whisky which he had consumed were making Jock drowsy. He had not touched any of the food, and his chin had begun to sink on his chest. Soon he slipped from his seat and lay huddled, a snoring mass, on the flagged floor. Luckie made as though to lift him, but I forbade her.
"Let him be: he'll only be quarrelsome if you wake him, and he's quite safe on the floor."
"That's as may be," said Luckie, "but ye're no' gaun to stop a' nicht, or ye'll never catch the deserter, and ye canna leave Jock Tamson to sleep in my kitchen. I'm a dacint widda' woman, and nae scandal has ever soiled my name; and I'll no' hae it said that ony man ever sleepit in my hoose, and me by my lane, since I buried my ain man thirty years sin'."
"That's all right," I replied, "have no fear. If Jock is not awake when I go, I'll carry him out and put him in the ditch by the roadside."
The old woman laughed quietly. "Fegs, that's no' bad; he'll get the fricht o' his life when he waukens up in the cauld o' the mornin' and sees the stars abune him instead o' the bauks o' my kitchen."
I had been doing justice to the good fare of the house, but a look at the "wag-at-the-wa'" warned me that I must delay no longer. But there was something I must discover. I took my pipe from my pocket and as I filled it said: "I should think, Luckie, that you are well acquainted with this countryside."
"Naebody better," she replied. "I was born in Blednoch and I've spent a' my days between there and Penninghame Kirk. No' that I've bothered the kirk muckle," she added.
"Then," I said, "suppose a deserter was minded to make for the hills on the other side o' the Cree, where think you he would try to cross the river?"
"If he wisna a fule," she said, "he'd ford it juist ayont the Carse o' Bar. Aince he's ower it's a straicht road to the heichts o' Millfore."