ainted with George Willison, or that he was now married to his
sister. We may explain that George Dempster was in the family at
the time when Geordie brought home the child; and, in some of his
conversations with his wife, he did not hesitate to say that he
suspected that Lady Maitland bore a child to a French lackey, who was
then about the house; but the child never made its appearance, and
strong grounds existed for believing that it was made away with. Geordie
himself sometimes heard these stories; but he affected to be altogether
indifferent to them, putting a silly question to Dempster, as if he had
just awakened from sleep, and had forgot the thread of the discourse,
and, when he got his answer, pretending to fall asleep again.

In the meantime the young foundling, who had been christened Jessie
Warriston, by Geordie's desire, grew up to womanhood. She became,
in every respect, the picture of her mother--tall and noble in her
appearance. Her hair was jet black, and her eye partook of the same
colour, with a lustre that dazzled the beholder. Her manners were
cheerful and kind; and she was grateful for the most ordinary attentions
paid to her by Widow Willison, or her daughter--the latter of whom often
took her out with her to the house of Ludovic Brodie, commonly called
Birkiehaugh, a nephew of Sir Marmaduke Maitland, with whom George
Dempster was serving as butler, in his temporary house, about a mile
south from Edinburgh.

This young laird had seen Jessie Warriston, and been struck with her
noble appearance. He asked Dempster who she was, and was told that she
was a young person who lived with one of his wife's friends. Brodie,
whose character was that of a most unprincipled rake, often endeavoured
to make up to Jessie, as she went backwards and forwards between his
house and Widow Willison's. In all endeavours he had been unsuccessful;
for Jessie--independently of being aware, from the admonitions of the
pious Widow Willison, that an acquaintanceship with a person above her
degree was improper and dangerous--had a lover of her own, a young man
of the name of William Forbes, a clerk to Mr. Carstairs, an advocate,
at that time in great practice at the Scotch bar. Forbes generally
accompanied Jessie when she went out at night, after she told him that
Brodie had insulted her; and she discontinued her visits to George
Dempster.

Foiled by the precautions which Jessie took to avoid him, Brodie only
became more dete