tter fra the queen to a painter lad!
Picters will rise i' the mairket--it will be an order to paint the
bairns. I hae brought him luck; I am real pleased." And on Gatty's
return, canvas in hand, she whipped the document behind her, and said
archly, "I hae something for ye, a tecket fra a leddy, ye'll no want
siller fra this day."

"Indeed!"

"Ay! indeed, fra a great leddy; it's vara gude o' me to gie ye it; heh!
tak it."

He did take it, looked stupefied, looked again, sunk into a chair, and
glared at it.

"Laddy!" said Christie.

"This is a new step on the downward path," said the poor painter.

"Is it no an orrder to paint the young prence?" said Christie, faintly.

"No!" almost shrieked the victim. "It's a writ! I owe a lot of money.

"Oh, Chairles!"

"See! I borrowed sixty pounds six months ago of a friend, so now I owe
eighty!"

"All right!" giggled the unfriendly visitor at the door, whose departure
had been more or less fictitious.

Christie, by an impulse, not justifiable, but natural, drew her
oyster-knife out, and this time the man really went away.

"Hairtless mon!" cried she, "could he no do his am dirrty work, and no
gar me gie the puir lad th' action, and he likeit me sae weel!" and she
began to whimper.

"And love you more now," said he; "don't you cry, dear, to add to my
vexation."

"Na! I'll no add to your vexation," and she gulped down her tears.

"Besides, I have pictures painted worth two hundred pounds; this is only
for eighty. To be sure you can't sell them for two hundred pence when
you want. So I shall go to jail, but they won't keep me long."

Then he took a turn, and began to fall into the artistic, or true view
of matters, which, indeed, was never long absent from him.

"Look here, Christie," said he, "I am sick of conventional assassins,
humbugging models, with dirty beards, that knit their brows, and try to
look murder; they never murdered so much as a tom-cat. I always go in
for the real thing, and here I shall find it."

"Dinna gang in there, lad, for ony favor."

"Then I shall find the accessories of a picture I have in my
head--chains with genuine rust and ancient mouldering stones with the
stains of time." His eye brightened at the prospect.

"You among fiefs, and chains, and stanes! Ye'll break my hairt, laddy,
ye'll no be easy till you break my hairt." And this time the tears would
not be denied.

"I love you for crying; don't cry;" and he fished from the c