"I didna do it for naething," remarked Cleaver's boy, tartly. "I didna do it ava'. It was you that left the spigot rinnin and the plug in!" he added, after a thoughtful pause, while he realised how cool a sitz-bath can be, even on a summer evening, when one stands by an open window.
Now nothing is more provoking, when you are performing a high and noble work in the reformation of another person's morals, than to have the thread of your weighty discourse broken by something so ridiculous as sitting down in a bucket of water. There was every reason why Cleaver's boy should be annoyed.
But Janet broke out in a sobbing ecstacy of laughter, which irritated her lover more even than her wrong-doing.
"I wonder at you," he said, "telling a' thae lees when ye haena a dress to your back, forbye the alpaca that ye pit on on Sabbaths!"
It was a mistake, and Cleaver's boy knew it as soon as he had the words out of his mouth.
Janet instantly stopped in the midst of her laughter.
"I would have you know," she said with dignity, "that I shall accept the invitation. And I will never speak to you again. I'll thank you to take yourself out of my presence, James Annan!"
"And out of Bailie Holden's back-kitchen!" continued her lover, whose colour did not diminish with the growing coolness consequent upon standing in a draught. Then as he went up the steps from the area he cried, "Be sure and put on the brocade, Janet!"
It was an unbearable affront, for Janet had told her stories so often, and with so much innocent feeling, that though, of course, she could not quite believe them herself, she had nevertheless all the feelings of an indignant moralist insulted and outraged in her tenderest susceptibilities.