“We are two noblemen, travelling for pleasure,” said he.
She crossed her arms, snorting.
“Heuch!” she exclaimed contemptuously. “A’ wish ma gudeman was hame. He’d sort the pair o’ ye!”
“If you think we have any design on your virtue,” he continued, “I beg you to dismiss the idea. I assure you, you are safe with us. We are persons of the greatest delicacy, and my friend is a musician of the first rank. I myself am what you see—your humble servant and admirer.”
“Ye’re a leear and a Frenchman!” cried she.
Her eyes blazed. A little more provocation, and she might have attacked him. At this moment Wattie’s cart drove into the yard behind her, axle deep in the sea of mud and manure that filled the place. She turned upon the new-comer. She could not deal with Archie, but the beggar was a foe she could understand, and she advanced, a whirl of abuse, upon him. The yellow dog’s growling rose, battling with her strident tones, and Archie, seeing the mischief his tongue had wrought, limped out, fearful of what might happen.
“Stand awa’ frae the doag, wumman! He’ll hae the legs o’ ye roogit aff yer henches gin he get’s a haud o’ ye!” roared Wattie, as the yellow body leaped and bounded in the traces.
Amid a hurricane of snarling and shouts he contrived, by plying his stick, to turn the animals and to get them out of the yard.
Archie followed him, but before he did so he paused to turn to his enemy, who had taken shelter in the doorway of the barn. He could not take off his hat to her because he had no hat to take off, having lost it on Inchbrayock Island, but he blew a kiss from the points of his fingers with an air that almost made her choke. Wattie, looking back over his shoulder, called angrily to him. He could not understand what he had done to the woman to move her to such a tempest of wrath, but he told himself that, in undertaking to escort Archie, he had made a leap in the dark. He would direct him to his cousin’s house of entertainment in Aberbrothock, and return to his own haunts without delay.
At the nearest point of road the boy was standing by a sorry-looking nag that he held by the ear.