Somewhat indignant at this burst of tender feeling towards the author of her misery, Jeanie could not help exclaiming—"O Effie, how can ye speak that gate of sic a man as that?"
"We maun forgie our enemies, ye ken," said poor Effie, with a timid look and a subdued voice; for her conscience told her what a different character the feelings with which she regarded her seducer bore, compared with the Christian charity under which she attempted to veil it.
"And ye hae suffered a' this for him, and ye can think of loving him still?" said her sister, in a voice betwixt pity and blame.
"Love him!" answered Effie—"If I hadna loved as woman seldom loves, I hadna been within these wa's this day; and trow ye, that love sic as mine is lightly forgotten?—Na, na—ye may hew down the tree, but ye canna change its bend—And, O Jeanie, if ye wad do good to me at this moment, tell me every word that he said, and whether he was sorry for poor Effie or no!"
"What needs I tell ye onything about it?" said Jeanie. "Ye may be sure he had ower muckle to do to save himsell, to speak lang or muckle about ony body beside."
"That's no true, Jeanie, though a saunt had said it," replied Effie, with a sparkle of her former lively and irritable temper. "But ye dinna ken, though I do, how far he pat his life in venture to save mine." And looking at Ratcliffe, she checked herself and was silent.
"I fancy," said Ratcliffe, with one of his familiar sneers, "the lassie thinks that naebody has een but hersell—Didna I see when Gentle Geordie was seeking to get other folk out of the Tolbooth forby Jock Porteous?—but ye are of my mind, hinny—better sit and rue, than flit and rue—ye needna look in my face sae amazed. I ken mair things than that, maybe."
"O my God! my God!" said Effie, springing up and throwing herself down on her knees before him—"D'ye ken where they hae putten my bairn?—O my bairn! my bairn! the poor sackless innocent new-born wee ane—bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh!—O man, if ye wad e'er deserve a portion in Heaven, or a brokenhearted creature's blessing upon earth, tell me where they hae put my bairn—the sign of my shame, and the partner of my suffering! tell me wha has taen't away, or what they hae dune wi't?"