nnockburn.

MOORE. O, rot! I ain't a parson, I ain't; I never had no college
education. Business is business. That's wot's the matter with me.

BRODIE. Ay, so we said when you lost that fight with Newcastle Jemmy,
and sent us home all poor men. That was a nick above _you_.

MOORE. Newcastle Jemmy! Muck: that's my opinion of him: muck. I'll mop
the floor up with him any day, if so be as you or any on 'em 'll make it
worth my while. If not, muck! That's my motto. Wot I now ses is, about
that 'ere crib at Leslie's, wos I right, I ses? or wos I wrong? That's
wot's the matter with you.

BRODIE. You are both right and wrong. You dared me to do it. I was
drunk; I was upon my mettle; and I as good as did it. More than that,
blackguardly as it was, I enjoyed the doing. He is my friend. He had
dined with me that day, and I felt like a man in a story. I climbed his
wall, I crawled along his pantry roof, I mounted his window-sill. That
one turn of my wrist--you know it!--and the casement was open. It was as
dark as the pit, and I thought I'd won my wager, when, phewt! down went
something inside, and down went somebody with it. I made one leap, and
was off like a rocket. It was my poor friend in person; and if he'd
caught and passed me on to the watchman under the window, I should have
felt no viler rogue than I feel just now.

MOORE. I s'pose he knows you pretty well by this time?

BRODIE. 'Tis the worst of friendship. Here, Kirsty, fill these glasses.
Moore, here's better luck--and a more honourable plant!--next time.

MOORE. Deacon, I looks towards you. But it looks thundering like rotten
eggs, don't it?

BRODIE. I think not. I was masked, for one thing, and for another I was
as quick as lightning. He suspects me so little that he dined with me
this very afternoon.

MOORE. Anyway, you ain't game to try it on again, I'll lay odds on that.
Once bit, twice shy. That's your motto.

BRODIE. Right again. I'll put my _alibi_ to a better use. And, Badger,
one word in your ear: there's no Newcastle Jemmy about _me_. Drop the
subject, and for good, or I shall drop you. (_He rises, and walks
backwards and forwards, a little unsteadily; then returns, and sits, L.,
as before._)

SCENE II

_To these, HUNT, disguised_

_He is disguised as a "flying stationer" with a patch over his eye. He
sits at table opposite BRODIE'S, and is served with bread and cheese and
beer._

HAMILTON (_from behind_). The deevil tak' the cairts!