Volume Iii Part 10 (2/2)
hout fie! Wha ever saw young chields hae sic luchts o' yellow hair hingin fleeing in the wind? Come, come, strap and string down; swaddle it round wi' sax dizzen o' wheelbands, and fasten a steel-belted fur cap ower aboon a'. Yare, yare! Lord sauff us! Here they come! What's to be our fate? Keep close for a wee while.”
”Hilloa! Wha hauds the house!” was vollied from the door by the deep-toned voice of Will Laidlaw.
”There's nae body in but me, and I downa come to the door. Ye had better ride on,” cried old Peter, in a weak tremulous voice.
”Wilt thou answer to thy name, or hast thou a name to answer to?” said Will, feigning to speak the broad Northumberland dialect, which sorted very ill with his tongue: ”An thou be'st leel man and true, coome and bid thee guests wailcome. It is G.o.d speed, or spulzie wi' thee in three handclaps.”
”Spulzie, quo the man!” exclaimed Peter: ”The muckle fiend spulzie the unmannerly gab that spake it!”--and with that he came stooping over his staff, and coughing to the door, speaking in a quavering treble key. ”A bonny like purpose! What wad ye spulzie frae a poor auld man that hasna as muckle atween him and the grave as will pay for howking it, and buy a hagabag winding sheet? Spulzie, quo he! That is a good joke!--he--he--he, (cough) hoh--hoh--hoh. I'm sae ill wi' that host!
Eh? wha hae we a' here? Strangers, I think!
”Goodman, we were directed to your house for a night's entertainment or two, if you are the old rich yeoman ycleped Patrick Chisholm of Castle-Weary.”
”Na, na! I'm nae rich yeoman! I'm naething but a poor herried, forsaken, reduced auld man! I hae nae up-putting for ought better than a flea. Ye had better ride on down to Commonside. There's plenty there baith for man and horse. Come away, I'll set you down the length o' the ford, and let ye see the right gate.”
”Come neighbours, let us go away as he says, We'll never make our quarters good on this auld carle,” said Sandy Pot, in a whisper to his companions: ”And troth do ye ken I wad rather lie at the back of the dike, before I imposed myself on ony body. Od my heart's wae for the poor auld n.i.g.g.ard.”
”Come away, lads, come away,” cried Peter. ”The days are unco short e'now; ye haena time to put off.”
”Stop short there, my good fellow,” cried Laidlaw, ”We have some other fish to fry with you before we go. I am informed you have a large stock in hand of the goods in which we deal. You have had lucky lifts this year. Plenty of good hides with you?”
”Rank misprision, and base rascally jests on a poor auld man. Not a single hide about the hale town, foreby the ane on my back,” cried old Peter.
”My orders are, worthy old yeoman, to give fair prices to such as produce their hides,” said Laidlaw. But whoever refuses, I am obliged to search for them; and if I find any I take them at my own price.”
”O dear, honest gentlemen, I downa joke wi' ye: hoh, hoh,” coughed Peter. ”Gin ye be for a place to stay in a' night, come away as lang as it is daylight.”
”Why, with your leave my good fellow, we must lodge with you to-night.
Hearth-room and ha'-room, steed-room and sta'-room, is the friendly stranger's right here. Small things will serve: a stone of English beef or so, and two or three pecks of oats.”
”Beef, quoth the man? Ye may as weel look for a white corby as beef in my pantry, or aits in my barn. Will ye no come away.”
”Not till I makes a search for your nolt hides, honest yeoman. To that am I bound.”
The four skin-dealers next the door alighted and went in, leaving their horses with the other two, who went and put them up in a good large stable with plenty of stalls. Peter ran back to the house in perfect agony, speaking to himself all the way. ”They are very misleared chaps thae. They maun surely either be Low Dutch, or else sutors o' Selkirk, that they are sae mad about skins. I little wat how I am to get rid o' them.”
The two la.s.ses appeared armed cap-a-pee like two young men; and though Bess was Will Laidlaw's own sweetheart, he did not recognize her through the disguise, neither did she once suspect him. The two made a little swaggering about the _pelt-dealers_ as they called them entering the pantry, but not choosing to measure arms with them, the weak suffered the strong to pa.s.s; and Will having his cue, soon discovered the huge barrels of beef below the ground, with empty ones above them. Old Peter shed tears of vexation when he saw this huge and highly-valued store was all discovered, but had not a word to say for himself, save now and then ”A' fairly come by, and hardly won; and there is nae right nor law that says honest men should be eaten up wi'
sorners. May ane speir where ye come frae, or by wha's right ye do this!”
”Why man dost thou no hear and dost thou no see that we're coome joost from Nworthoomberland!”
”Aha!” thought Peter to himself; ”English thieves after a! I had some hopes that I could distinguish Scots tongues in their heads. But a's gane, a's gane!”
”Now auld yeoman, if thou hast a word of trooth in thee, tell us where the hides are, and we will pay thee for them.”
”No ae hide about the town. No ane, either little or muckle.”
”Why soore am I them coos doodnae coome to thee withoot heydes, did they? That I can answer for, they had a' heydes and bonns baith when they came from hwome.”
”Waur than ever! Waur than ever!” exclaimed Pate Chisholm to himself as he sought another apartment: ”The very men that the kye were reaved frae come to take revenge! Callant, come here and speak wi' me. Haste to a neighbour's house, and raise the fray. We shall never be a'
quietly put down wi' half a dozen.”
”Dearest father,” said May, ”I dinna think the men mean ony ill, if ye wad be but civil.”
<script>