"Where are your certificates o' residence?" said I.
He handed me a certificate, signed and attested wi' apparent regularity, but which I was predetermined to doubt, wi' a' the obstinacy o' a guid dogmatic sceptic.
"I fancy you'll be the George Webster mentioned here yersel, Mr Hugh Kennedy," said I.
He started, at the very least, three guid thumb-measured inches, frae my floor. The stroke was nearly as pithy as that he applied to me in the Warlocks' Glen.
"That is my name in the certificate, there," said he, recovering.
"I ken that brawly, Mr Kennedy," said I. "George Webster's your present name; but I forget neither auld names nor auld friends. Some folk, wi' new-fangled notions, hae, now-a-days, three names. Even Mr Meiklejohn, guid man, baptized his son Finlay Johnstone Meiklejohn, to the admiration o' the twa-named congregation o' St Fillan's; but it canna be expected that, when the laddie comes up, we are aye to address him by his three names. It would be owre great an expense o' wind and time."
"I have neither wind nor time to spend in this foolery," said he. "That is my name in the paper, and there are your fees."
"I dinna want to quarrel wi' you, Mr Kennedy," said I, "because I hae owre muckle respect for Mrs Kennedy—Lucy Græme, the dochter o' Arthur Græme o' Sunnybrae, on Tweedside—and her bonny bairn, to get into a dispute wi' the husband o' the ane and the father o' the other. But I can keep a secret, man. What are ye alarmed about? Though ye knocked me doun in the Warlocks' Glen, I hae nae ill-will to ye. I dinna object to cry ye next Sabbath, wi' May Walker; but ae gude turn deserves anither—ye can do me a service."
This statement utterly confounded Mr Kennedy. He tried first to bluster and swear, denied the truth of my assertion, calmed, blustered again; in short, gaed through a' thae useless and affected turns and movements that a hooked salmon taks the unnecessary trouble to do before it turns up the white o' its wame.
"Calm yoursel, my dear sir," said I. "Mrs Lucy Kennedy is in my power, under my key. She daurna stir. Ye may be married and awa lang afore she kens onything about it, puir thing. We can settle a bit o' ordinar business without the interference o' a woman. I pledge ye ye'll neither hear nor see her, if ye'll promise to do me the favour I want aff ye."