Part 19 (1/2)
”I wonder wha the man was?”
”I think he was my father.”
”I thought you didna ken what a father was?”
”I know now. I think my father was a Scotsman.”
”What makes you think that?”
”I heard a Thrums woman say it would account for my being called Grizel, and I think we came to Scotland to look for him, but it is so long, long ago.”
”How long?”
”I don't know. We have lived here four years, but we were looking for him before that. It was not in this part of Scotland we looked for him.
We gave up looking for him before we came here.”
”What made the Painted Lady take a house here, then?”
”I think it was because the Den is so like the place she used to meet him in long ago.”
”What was his name?”
”I don't know.”
”Does the Painted Lady no tell you about yoursel'?”
”No, she is angry if I ask.”
”Her name is Mary, I've heard?”
”Mary Gray is her name, but--but I don't think it is her real name.”
”How, does she no use her real name?”
”Because she wants her own mamma to think she is dead.”
”What makes her want that?”
”I am not sure, but I think it is because there is me. I think it was naughty of me to be born. Can you help being born?”
Tommy would have liked to tell her about Reddy, but forbore, because he still believed that he had acted criminally in that affair, and so for the time being the inquisition ended. But though he had already discovered all that Grizel knew about her mother and nearly all that curious Thrums ever ferreted out, he returned to the subject at the next meeting in the Den.
”Where does the Painted Lady get her money?”
”Oh,” said Grizel, ”that is easy. She just goes into that house called the bank, and asks for some, and they give her as much as she likes.”
”Ay, I've heard that, but--”
The remainder of the question was never uttered. Instead,
”Hod ahint a tree!” cried Tommy, hastily, and he got behind one himself; but he was too late; Elspeth was upon them; she had caught them together at last.