So I went into the house again, and sat down quite contented; and a nicht or twa after, the weather having settled, I went to see her at her faither's. The auld folk received me, as usual, very kindly; and the auld man got a seat for me next the fire, and inquired if there were any news—while his guidwife asked me if I wadna hae my stockings changed, as the roads were very wet, and my feet might be damp—and I thanked her, and said "No." But there sat my intended, plaiting at a cap-border, or frill, or something o' that sort, as stiff and as silent as a stucco image, never letting on that she either saw or heard me. I spoke to her twice or thrice, and she gied a sort o' low, half cough, half hem! but not a syllable did I get out o' her. Never did she look to the side o' the house I was on. Her head seemed to be fixed in a blacksmith's vice in an opposite direction, and dear kens what sort o' cap or frill it was she keepit plait, plait, plaiting at; but her task was never like to come to an end, and she keepit pingle, pingling, and nip, nipping at it wi' a knife, until my patience was fairly worn out. In my opinion her fingers had discovered the perpetual motion; and when I had sat until vexation and anxiety were like to choke me, I felt a sort o' ha!—ha!—haing! in my throat, as though I could hae burst out into a fit o' passion, or greeting, or I dinna ken what—and wi' a great struggle I got up, and I managed to say—
"Will ye speak at the door, Isabella dear?"
"I canna be fashed!" said she.
O sir! sir! had ye experienced what I felt at that moment. The lounderings o' my faither, my mother, and my dominie, and the slights o' former sweethearts, were a mere naething to what her answer caused me to endure. I expected naething but that I would drop down upon the floor.
"Oh, ye foolish lassie, ye!" said her mother, who was sorry for me, "what do ye mean?"
"Get up!" said her faither.
"I canna be fashed!" said she again, more cuttingly than before, and half turned her een upon me, as she said it, in a manner that gaed through my breast as if ye had drawn a sharp knife across it.
Weel, sir, our names were ca'ed on the Sunday following; and between the first day o' their being published, and the day on which the marriage was to take place, I was three or four times back and forward at her faither's—but I got nae mair out o' her. I almost thought that I ought to stop the banns; but I thought, again, that that would be very unco like, and very contrary to what I wished; so I allowed them to go on, Sunday after Sunday.
I never imagined but that she was just in the pet at me having broken my tryst, and that, like everybody that was in the pet, she would come out o't when she found it necessary, and the sooner frae being left to hersel. But, on the very day we had fixed for the wedding, and when the best-man and I went to her faither's house, expecting to find her and the best-maid, and the whole o' them, in readiness to go before the minister—to my unutterable astonishment and dismay, there was she, sitting in her morning gown, as unconcerned as a judge, just as if naething had been to happen.
"Mercy me! Isabella!" says I, "are ye no ready?—where's the women?"