“It’ll be a sair dispensation to you, Maister William,” quoth John, “this morning’s news. Ye wud be wonderfully struck and put about when ye heard it.”
“It is, indeed,” said I, throwing as much of mournfulness as possible into the tones of my voice. “Heavy news indeed, and most unexpected. Great cause have I to grieve. My poor dear aunt to be thus lost to me for ever!”
“Nae doubt, nae doubt, Maister William, ye maun hae a heavy heartfu’. We were a’ jalousing as muckle,—that’s me, Souple Rab, and wee Jamie; however, it’ll no do to be coosten down a’thegither,—a rainy night may bring a blithe morrow. Every thing is uncertain in this world but death! But come on, Kate;” and John and my reeking jade disappeared in the direction towards the stable; John, no doubt, bursting with impatience till he could communicate to his select cabinet, Souple Rab and wee Jamie, the awsome and doncie looks of the young laird.
I was yet lingering on the threshold in a most comfortable frame of mind, when the door was thrown open. Imagine my horror when the first figure I saw was my aunt herself, not in the drapery of the grave, but bedizzened with ribbons from head to heel, and leaning her withered hand on the arm of the Reverend Mr Sickerscreed. I gasped for breath—my tongue swelled and clung to the roof of my mouth—my eyes literally started from their sockets as if they would leave their bony casements altogether. Had I not caught hold of the porch, down I should have dropped.
“Am I in my senses, aunt? Do I see you really alive? Is this no unreal mockery—no cruel hallucination? Resolve me, for Heaven’s sake, else I go mad.”
“Dear me, nephew,” said the old lady, “what agitates you so? I feel so glad that you have paid me this visit ere I set off on my marriage jaunt with the elect of my heart, your worthy connection, Mr Sickerscreed.”
“Marriage!” thundered I, “marriage!—I came to mourn over your bier, not to laugh at your bridal. O, the infernal cruelty, Mr What’s-your-name, to despatch your pharisaical letter sealed with black wax.”
“Young wrathful,” meekly rejoined Mr Samuel, “it was dark green wax, most emblematic, as I said to your aunt, my dear spouse, of the unfading verdure of our harmonious affections.”
“Black and green fiends dog you to Satan,” roared I. “What an ass you have made of me! Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness. Oh! Broadcroft, Lilliesacre, Kittleford, Cozieholm, and Oxgang, perished in the clap of a hand, and for ever! The churchman’s paw is upon you, and a poor fellow has no chance now of a single rood!”
With some more stuff of this kind, I parted with my venerable aunt and her smooth-tongued spouse. These petrifactions of humanity had the charity, I suppose, to consider me moon-struck. I heard Mr Samuel sweetly observe, that verily the young lad’s scholarship had driven him mad. I wished the rogue at the bottom of the Red Sea, or in the farthest bog of Connaught, paring turf and cultivating potatoes—anywhere but where I now saw him. I could have eaten him up raw and unsodden, without salt or pepper, where he stood—ground his bones to dust, or spit upon him till he was drowned in the flood of my spite. I did neither; but throwing myself again on the back of Kate, off I scampered home, more like a fury than a man.