"Good day, Hector." The horseman urged his horse with his knees, and the company, breaking into a trot, swept past and turned on to the main road which led towards the village.
As the last of the troopers swung round the corner, the packman donned his bonnet, and sitting down spat after the departing cavalcade. "Bloody Dalzell," he said, "the Russian Bear--a human deevil. Damn him!"
The sudden change in the packman's demeanour astonished me. I looked at him searchingly, but he had begun to arrange the contents of his bundle before binding it up.
"Why did you tell Sir Thomas such a string of lies about me?" I said.
He chuckled softly and looked at me, his left eyelid drooping, his right eye alertly wide. "I had ta'en a fancy to ye," he said, "and I was loth to run the risk o' partin' wi' a scholar when a lee micht keep him. Hoo dae I ken that ye're no a Covenanter? I was takin' nae chances. I nearly laughed in his face when Sir Thomas, the ignorant sumph, thocht ye were readin' a book o' operas. That's a guid ane! Mony a laugh I'll ha'e in the lang winter nichts when I remember it. I'm no' askin' ye wha or what ye are. You ha'e the Latin and I jalouse ye're an Englishman: but till it pleases ye to tell me something aboot yersel', I ken nae mair."
As he talked he was pulling his coarse linen covering over his pack. He buckled the broad strap which held it together, and continued: "I suppose ye're makin' for Dumfries. So am I, but I'm no' travellin' the direct road. I'm haudin' awa' roon' by the loch to New Abbey. I aye like to visit the Abbey. They ca' it the Abbey o' Dulce Cor--a bonnie name and it commemorates a bonnie romance."
My interest was awakened, and I asked him to tell me more.
"Ay," he said, "it's a bonnie tale, and guid to remember. I wonder if the widda at Locharbriggs would dae as much for me as Devorgilla did for her man. Nae doot ye ha'e heard o' her. I am credibly informed that she built a college at Oxford, and dootless ye ken she built the brig at Dumfries. But she did better than that, for when her man deid she carried his heart aboot wi' her in a' her travels in a silver casket. She built the Abbey o' Dulce Cor to his memory and she lies there hersel', wi' the heart o' her husband in her bonnie white arms. As the poet has it:
"In Dulce Cop Abbey she taketh her rest,
With the heart of her husband embalmed on her breast."
A memory of Mary flamed like a rose in my heart. I choked down my tears and said: