‘I am not just free to condescend on my name,’ said Peter; ‘and as for my business—there is a wee dribble of brandy in the stoup—it would be wrang to leave it to the lass—it is learning her bad usages.’
‘Well, thou shalt have the brandy, and be d—d to thee, if thou wilt tell me what you are making here.’
‘Seeking a young advocate chap that they ca’ Alan Fairford, that has played me a slippery trick, and ye maun ken a’ about the cause,’ said Peter.
‘An advocate, man!’ answered the captain of the JUMPING JENNY—for it was he, and no other, who had taken compassion on Peter’s drought; ‘why, Lord help thee, thou art on the wrong side of the Firth to seek advocates, whom I take to be Scottish lawyers, not English.’
‘English lawyers, man!’ exclaimed Peter, ‘the deil a lawyer’s in a’ England.’
‘I wish from my soul it were true,’ said Ewart; ‘but what the devil put that in your head?’
‘Lord, man, I got a grip of ane of their attorneys in Carlisle, and he tauld me that there wasna a lawyer in England ony mair than himsell that kend the nature of a multiple-poinding! And when I told him how this loopy lad, Alan Fairford, had served me, he said I might bring an action on the case—just as if the case hadna as mony actions already as one case can weel carry. By my word, it is a gude case, and muckle has it borne, in its day, of various procedure—but it’s the barley-pickle breaks the naig’s back, and wi’ my consent it shall not hae ony mair burden laid upon it.’
‘But this Alan Fairford?’ said Nanty—‘come—sip up the drop of brandy, man, and tell me some more about him, and whether you are seeking him for good or for harm.’
‘For my ain gude, and for his harm, to be sure,’ said Peter. ‘Think of his having left my cause in the dead-thraw between the tyneing and the winning, and capering off into Cumberland here, after a wild loup-the-tether lad they ca’ Darsie Latimer.’
‘Darsie Latimer!’ said Mr. Geddes, hastily; ‘do you know anything of Darsie Latimer?’