The McBrides | Page 9

his baby fist,
his wee voice whimpered, and his outflung arm struck his mother in the
face.

"Oh, oh," she cried; "will you turn on me too, and leave me for farmer's
wenches and tinker women like the lave of your folk?"
The gipsy lass was on her knees at the bedside.
"Lady," she cries, and her face was finely aglow, "nae wonder ye
grieved aboot the colour o' the bairn's hair. Are ye a' Dan mad?" Then
when she saw the anger in the mother's eyes she cries--
"Ye'll maybe be in a mood to listen to the truth now."
"I'm in a fine mood to have ye whipped from my doors, ye
shameless . . ."
"Ay, shameless, madam, if I love I'll be that, but if I have a man I'll
share him wi' nane, and you'll not be yourself to be believing these false
tales; and you, Betty, I had thought ye had seen sorrow enough without
brimming your cup over. It's true I left a wean sleeping in the sweet hay;
was there harm in that? She's lain wi' me in the stable lofts and outlying
barns these many nights, but the wean is nane o' mine. It's an ill bird
that fouls its ain nest, Betty, and when a' the auld wives are shakin'
their mutches at the end o' peat stacks and sayin', 'This'll be another o'
his; ye might have asked yourself how? The poor wee mitherless mite;
her feet will be on the neck o' her enemies, and, mistress, maybe I can
tell ye why. I hinna leed tae ye yet, and ye can whip me from your
doors if ye will, but hard, hard will it fa' on them that raise the
scourge."
Such a look passed between these two, so full of meaning, that my aunt
told Betty to leave her.
"And keep better manners among your wenches," said she, "for I will
not have Dan tormented with the baggage; and tell him I hope my son
will grow tall and strong like him, for I will be mindful of his
kindness."
"Indeed, indeed, he would be very good, my dearie," cried Betty,
anxious to make amends. "When ye were taken ill he lay in the kitchen

the lang night through, and his horse saddled and bridled ready in his
stall; ay, and he would not go to bed for the Laird himsel'. Indeed,
many a wild night he galloped through, and him oot in the morning
when the doctor had left."
Belle had slipped out as the old woman was speaking, and now came
back with her tartan bundle; and when Betty had left the room the gipsy
took from the shawl a wean that cried so lustily that it wakened the heir
to all Nourn.
As the women whispered and crooned over the bairns, their cries
resounded through the house, and made it no place for men-folk.
But crossing the yard, Betty beckoned me with a crooked forefinger.
"Who's wean is that, think ye, Hamish, that Belle brought here?"
"I think you should be asking Belle," said I.
"Ask here or ask there," says Betty, "the wean has a look o'--dinna be
feart, my lad--the wean has the look o' John o' Scaurdale. And that,"
says she, "would be fair scandalous."
But after Betty's jalousing I had a word or two with Dan McBride, my
cousin.
"Wean," says he, "and Betty thinks the bairn has a look o' John o'
Scaurdale. It beats me, the cleverness of that woman. This is the story I
got from Belle, Hamish. It's a little dreich, but it will be as well that ye
should ken."
"Well," says Dan, "when ye were at the College in the toon and
learning yer tasks, there was a lass came to stop at Scaurdale, a niece
she was to the Laird there (a sister's wean, I am thinking), very prim
and bonny she was, and fu' o' nonsensical book-lore. She took a liking
to the place, and there are some that pretend to ken, that say she took
mair than a liking to the Laird's son. I would not say for that; he was a
brisk lad for so douce a lady. Well, well, Hamish, they cast out, and

away goes the lass in a huff to her ain folk, and then back comes the
word o' her wedding (some South-country birkie her man was, o' the
name o' Stockdale, if I mind it right), and when that word came, John o'
Scaurdale's son was like to go out at the rigging. We'll say naething
about that, Hamish; ye ken what came on him: his horse threw him at
the Laird's Turn yonder, and he never steered--he was by wi' it."
"What has this to do with