to ken that I am a gentleman;
I bear a king's name; I am nae rider to kick my shanks at your hall
door. Either give me an answer in civility, and that out of hand; or by
the top of Glencoe, I will ram three feet of iron through your vitals."

"Eh, man," cried my uncle, scrambling to his feet, "give me a meenit!
What's like wrong with ye? I'm just a plain man and nae dancing master;
and I'm tryin to be as ceevil as it's morally possible. As for that wild
talk, it's fair disrepitable. Vitals, says you! And where would I be
with my blunderbush?" he snarled.

"Powder and your auld hands are but as the snail to the swallow against
the bright steel in the hands of Alan," said the other. "Before your
jottering finger could find the trigger, the hilt would dirl on your
breast-bane."

"Eh, man, whae's denying it?" said my uncle. "Pit it as ye please, hae't
your ain way; I'll do naething to cross ye. Just tell me what like ye'll
be wanting, and ye'll see that we'll can agree fine."

"Troth, sir," said Alan, "I ask for nothing but plain dealing. In two
words: do ye want the lad killed or kept?"

"O, sirs!" cried Ebenezer. "O, sirs, me! that's no kind of language!"

"Killed or kept!" repeated Alan.

"O, keepit, keepit!" wailed my uncle. "We'll have nae bloodshed, if you
please."

"Well," says Alan, "as ye please; that'll be the dearer."

"The dearer?" cries Ebenezer. "Would ye fyle your hands wi' crime?"

"Hoot!" said Alan, "they're baith crime, whatever! And the killing's
easier, and quicker, and surer. Keeping the lad'll be a fashious* job, a
fashious, kittle business."

* Troublesome.

"I'll have him keepit, though," returned my uncle. "I never had naething
to do with onything morally wrong; and I'm no gaun to begin to pleasure
a wild Hielandman."

"Ye're unco scrupulous," sneered Alan.

"I'm a man o' principle," said Ebenezer, simply; "and if I have to pay
for it, I'll have to pay for it. And besides," says he, "ye forget the
lad's my brother's son."

"Well, well," said Alan, "and now about the price. It's no very easy for
me to set a name upon it; I would first have to ken some small matters.
I would have to ken, for instance, what ye gave Hoseason at the first
off-go?"

"Hoseason!" cries my uncle, struck aback. "What for?"

"For kidnapping David," says Alan.

"It's a lee, it's a black lee!" cried my uncle. "He was never kidnapped.
He leed in his throat that tauld ye that. Kidnapped? He never was!"