Although Claud had by this time recovered from the agitation into which he had been thrown, by the admonition he had as it were received from the divine oracle, he yet felt a profound emotion of awe as he again stretched his hand towards the sacred volume, which, when he had again opened, and again beheld the selfsame words, he trembled very exceedingly, insomuch that he made the table shake violently.
‘In the name of God, what’s that?’ cried his wife, terrified by the unusual motion, and raising her eyes from the book, with a strong expression of the fear which she then felt.
Claud was so startled, that he looked wildly behind him for a moment, with a ghastly and superstitious glare. Naturally possessing, however, a firm and steady mind, his alarm scarcely lasted a moment; but the pious business of the evening was so much disturbed, and had been to himself so particularly striking, that he suddenly quitted the table, and left the room.
CHAPTER XX
The Sabbath morning was calm and clear, and the whole face of Nature fresh and bright. Every thing was animated with glee; and the very flowers, as they looked up in the sunshine, shone like glad faces. Even the Leddy o’ Grippy partook of the gladdening spirit which glittered and frolicked around her; and as she walked a few paces in front of her husband down the footpath from the house to the highway leading to Glasgow, she remarked, as their dog ran gambolling before them, that
‘Auld Colley, wi’ his daffing, looks as he had a notion o’ the braw wissing o’ joy Charlie is to get. The brute, gudeman, ay took up wi’ him, which was a wonderfu’ thing to me; for he did nothing but weary its life wi’ garring it loup for an everlasting after sticks and chucky-stanes. Hows’ever, I fancy dogs are like men—leavened, as Mr. Kilfuddy says, wi’ the leaven of an ungrateful heart—for Colley is as doddy and crabbit to Watty as if he was its adversary, although, as ye ken, he gathers and keeps a’ the banes for’t.’
‘Wilt t’ou ne’er devaul’ wi’ thy havering tongue? I’m sure the dumb brute, in favouring Charlie, showed mair sense than his mother, poor fellow.’
‘Aye, aye, gudeman, so ye say; but every body knows your most unnatural partiality.’
‘Thy tongue, woman,’ exclaimed her husband, ‘gangs like the clatter-bane o’ a goose’s——’
‘Eh, Megsty me!’ cried the Leddy; ‘wha’s yon at the yett tirling at the pin?’
Claud, roused by her interjection, looked forward, and beheld, with some experience of astonishment, that it was Mr. Keelevin, the writer.
‘We’ll hae to turn and gang back with him,’ said Mrs. Walkinshaw, when she observed who it was.
‘I’ll be damn’d if I do ony sic thing,’ growled the old man, with a fierceness of emphasis that betrayed apprehension and alarm, while it at the same time denoted a riveted determination to persevere in the resolution he had taken; and, mending his pace briskly, he reached the gate before the worthy lawyer had given himself admittance.
‘Gude day, Mr. Keelevin!—What’s brought you so soon afield this morning?’
‘I hae just ta’en a bit canter oure to see you, and to speak anent yon thing.’
‘Hae ye got the papers made out?’
‘Surely—it can never be your serious intent—I would fain hope—nay, really, Mr. Walkinshaw, ye maunna think o’t.’
‘Hoot, toot, toot; I thought ye had mair sense, Mr. Keelevin. But I’m sorry we canna gae back wi’ you, for we’re just sae far in the road to see Charlie and his lady landless.’
‘’Deed are we,’ added Mrs. Walkinshaw; ‘and ye’ll no guess what the gudeman has in his pouch to gie them for hansel to their matrimony: the whole tot of a hundred pound, Mr. Keelevin—what think you o’ that?’
The lawyer looked first at the Leddy, and then at the Laird, and said, ‘Mr. Walkinshaw, I hae done you wrong in my thought.’
‘Say nae mair about it, but hae the papers ready by Wednesday, as I directed,’ replied Claud.
‘I hope and trust, Mr. Keelevin,’ said Mrs. Walkinshaw, ‘that he’s no about his will and testament: I redde ye, an he be, see that I’m no neglekit; and dinna let him do an injustice to the lave for the behoof of Charlie, wha is, as I say, his darling chevalier.’
Mr. Keelevin was as much perplexed as ever any member of the profession was in his life; but he answered cheerfully,
‘Ye need na be fear’t, Mrs. Walkinshaw, I’ll no wrang either you or any one of the family;’ and he added, looking towards her husband, ‘if I can help it.’
‘Na, thanks be an’ praise, as I understand the law, that’s no in your power; for I’m secured wi’ a jointure on the Grippy by my marriage articles; and my father, in his testament, ordained me to hae a hundred a year out of the barming o’ his lying money; the whilk, as I have myself counted, brings in to the gudeman, frae the wadset that he has on the Kilmarkeckle estate, full mair than a hundred and twenty-seven pounds; so I would wis both you and him to ken, that I’m no in your reverence; and likewise, too, Mr. Keelevin, that I’ll no faik a farthing o’ my right.’
Mr. Keelevin was still more perplexed at the information contained in this speech; for he knew nothing of the mortgage, or, as the Leddy called it, the wadset which Claud had on his neighbour Kilmarkeckle’s property, Mr. Omit having been employed by him in that business. Indeed, it was a regular part of Grippy’s pawkie policy, not to let his affairs be too well known, even to his most confidential legal adviser; but, in common transactions, to employ any one who could be safely trusted in matters of ordinary professional routine. Thus the fallacious impression which Claud had in some degree made on the day in which he instructed the honest lawyer respecting the entail was, in a great measure, confirmed; so that Mr. Keelevin, instead of pressing the remonstrance which he had come on purpose from Glasgow that morning to urge, marvelled exceedingly within himself at the untold wealth of his client.
In the meantime, Grippy and his Leddy continued walking towards the city, but the lawyer remounted his horse, pondering on what he had heard, and almost persuaded that Claud, whom he knew to be so close and wary in worldly matters, was acting a very prudent part. He conceived that he must surely be much richer than the world supposed; and that, seeing the natural defects of his second son, Walter, how little he was superior to an idiot, and judging he could make no good use of ready money, but might, on the contrary, become the prey of knavery, he had, perhaps, determined, very wisely, to secure to him his future fortune by the entail proposed, meaning to indemnify Charles from his lying money. The only doubt that he could not clear off entirely to his satisfaction, was the circumstance of George, the youngest son, being preferred in the limitations of the entail to his eldest brother. But even this admitted of something like a reasonable explanation; for, by the will of the grandfather, in the event of Walter dying without male issue, George was entitled to succeed to the Plealands, as heir of entail; the effect of all which, in the benevolent mind of honest Mr. Keelevin, contributed not a little to rebuild the good opinion of his client, which had suffered such a shock from the harshness of his instructions, as to induce him to pay the visit which led to the rencounter described; and in consequence he walked his horse beside the Laird and Leddy, as they continued to pick their steps along the shady side of the road.—Mrs. Walkinshaw, with her petticoats lifted half-leg high, still kept the van, and her husband followed stooping forward in his gait, with his staff in his left hand behind him—the characteristic and