n him for a while, exulting greatly in our
success, but yet with a sort of pity for the man's shame.
"Come, come, Mr. Ebenezer," said the lawyer, "you must not be
down-hearted, for I promise you we shall make easy terms. In the
meanwhile give us the cellar key, and Torrance shall draw us a bottle of
your father's wine in honour of the event." Then, turning to me, and
taking me by the hand, "Mr. David," says he, "I wish you all joy in your
good fortune, which I believe to be deserved." And then to Alan, with a
spice of drollery, "Mr. Thomson, I pay you my compliment; it was most
artfully conducted; but in one point you somewhat outran my
comprehension. Do I understand your name to be James? or Charles? or is
it George, perhaps?"
"And why should it be any of the three, sir?" quoth Alan, drawing
himself up, like one who smelt an offence.
"Only, sir, that you mentioned a king's name," replied Rankeillor; "and
as there has never yet been a King Thomson, or his fame at least has
never come my way, I judged you must refer to that you had in baptism."
This was just the stab that Alan would feel keenest, and I am free to
confess he took it very ill. Not a word would he answer, but stepped off
to the far end of the kitchen and sat down and sulked; and it was not
till I stepped after him, and gave him my hand, and thanked him by title
as the chief spring of my success, that he began to smile a bit, and was
at last prevailed upon to join our party.
By that time we had the fire lighted, and a bottle of wine uncorked; a
good supper came out of the basket, to which Torrance and I and Alan set
ourselves down; while the lawyer and my uncle passed into the next
chamber to consult. They stayed there closeted about an hour; at the end
of which period they had come to a good understanding, and my uncle and
I set our hands to the agreement in a formal manner. By the terms of
this, my uncle bound himself to satisfy Rankeillor as to his
intromissions, and to pay me two clear thirds of the yearly income of
Shaws.
So the beggar in the ballad had come home; and when I lay down that
night on the kitchen chests, I was a man of means and had a name in the
country. Alan and Torrance and Rankeillor slept and snored on their hard
beds; but for me, who had lain out under heaven and upon dirt and
stones, so many days and nights, and often with an empty belly, and in
fear of death, this good change in my case unmanned me more than any of
the
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