LITMIR.BIZ

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so at any cost, so soon as it vouchsafed to disclose itself and appear before my longing eyes. I therefore launched at once into practical details, in the discussion of which the Provost exhibited both shrewdness and good-will. He professed his readiness at once to become chairman of my committee, drew out a list of the most influential persons in the burgh to whom I ought immediately to apply, and gave me much information regarding the politics of the other places. From what he said, I gathered that, with the aid of the Clique, I was sure of Dreepdaily and Drouthielaw – as to the electors of Kittleweem, they were, in his opinion, "a wheen dirt," whom it would be useless to consult, and hopeless to conciliate. I certainly had no previous idea that the bulk of the electors had so little to say in the choice of their own representative. When I ventured to hint at the remote possibility of a revolt, the Provost indignantly exclaimed —

      "They daurna, sir – they daurna for the lives of them do it! Set them up indeed! Let me see ony man that wad venture to vote against the Town Council and the – and them, and I'll make a clean sweep of him out of Dreepdaily!"

      Nothing in short could have been more satisfactory than this statement.

      Whilst we were conversing together, I heard of a sudden a jingling in the next apartment, as it some very aged and decrepid harpsichord were being exorcised into the unusual effort of a tune. I glanced inquiringly to the door, but the Provost took no notice of my look. In a little time, however, there was a short preliminary cough, and a female voice of considerable compass took up the following strain. I remember the words not more from their singularity, than from the introduction to which they were the prelude: —

      "I heard a wee bird singing clear,

      In the tight, tight month o' June —

      'What garr'd ye buy when stocks were high,

      And sell when shares were doun?

      'Gin ye hae play'd me fause, my luve,

      In simmer 'mang the rain;

      When siller's scant and scarce at Yule

      I'll pay ye back again!

      'O bonny were the Midland Halves,

      When credit was sae free! —

      But wae betide the Southron loon

      That sold thae Halves to me!'"

      I declare, upon the word of a Railway Director, that I was never more taken aback in my life. Attached as I have been from youth to the Scottish ballad poetry, I never yet had heard a ditty of this peculiar stamp, which struck me as a happy combination of tender fancy with the sterner realities of the Exchange. Provost Binkie smiled as he remarked my amazement.

      "It's only my daughter Maggie, Mr Dunshunner," he said. "Puir thing! It's little she has here to amuse her, and sae she whiles writes thae kind o' sangs hersel'. She's weel up to the railroads, for ye ken I was an auld Glenmutchkin holder."

      "Indeed! Was that song Miss Binkie's own composition?" asked I, with considerable interest.

      "Atweel it is that, and mair too. Maggie, haud your skirling! – ye're interrupting me and the gentleman."

      "I beg, on no account, Mr Binkie, that I may be allowed to interfere with your daughter's amusement. Indeed it is full time that I were betaking myself to the hotel, unless you will honour me so far as to introduce me to Miss Binkie."

      "Deil a bit o' you gangs to the hotel to-night!" replied the hospitable Provost. "You bide where you are to denner and bed, and we'll hae a comfortable crack over matters in the evening. Maggie! come ben, lass, and speak to Mr Dunshunner."

      Miss Binkie, who I am strongly of opinion was all the while conscious of the presence of a stranger, now entered from the adjoining room. She was really a pretty girl; tall, with lively sparkling eyes and a profusion of dark hair, which she wore in the somewhat exploded shape of ringlets. I was not prepared for such an apparition, and I daresay blushed as I paid my compliments.

      Margaret Binkie, however, had no sort of mauvaise honte about her. She had received her final polish in a Glasgow boarding-school, and did decided credit to the seminary in which the operation had been performed. At all events she was the reverse of shy, for in less than a quarter of an hour we were rattling away as though we had been acquainted from childhood; and, to say the truth, I found myself getting into something like a strong flirtation. Old Binkie grinned a delighted smile, and went out to superintend the decanting of a bottle of port.

      I need not, I think, expatiate upon the dinner which followed. The hotch-potch was unexceptionable, the salmon curdy, and the lamb roasted without a fault; and if the red-armed Hebe who attended was somewhat awkward in her motions, she was at least zealous to a degree. The Provost got into high feather, and kept plying me perpetually with wine. When the cloth was removed, he drank with all formality to my success; and, as Margaret Binkie, with a laugh, did due honour to the toast, I could not do less than indulge in a little flight of fancy as I proposed the ladies, and, in connexion with them, the Flower of Dreepdaily – a sentiment which was acknowledged with a blush.

      After Miss Binkie retired, the Provost grew more and more convivial. He would not enter into business, but regaled me with numerous anecdotes of his past exploits, and of the lives and conversation of his compatriots in the Town Council – some of whom appeared, from his description, to be very facetious individuals indeed. More particularly, he dwelt upon the good qualities and importance of a certain Mr Thomas Gills, better known to his friends and kinsfolk by the sobriquet of Toddy Tam, and recommended me by all means to cultivate the acquaintance of that personage. But, however otherwise loquacious, nothing would persuade the Provost to launch out upon the subject of the Clique. He really seemed to entertain as profound a terror of that body as ever Huguenot did of the Inquisition, and he cut me short at last by ejaculating —

      "Sae nae mair on't, Mr Dunshunner – sae nae mair on't! It's ill talking on thae things. Ye dinna ken what the Clique is, nor whaur it is. But this I ken, that they are every where and a' aboot us; they hear every thing that passes in this house, and I whiles suspect that Mysie, the servant lass, is naething else than ane o' them in petticoats!"

      More than this I could not elicit. After we had finished a considerable quantum of port, we adjourned to the drawing-room, and, tea over, Miss Binkie sang to me several of her own songs, whilst the Provost snored upon the sofa. Both the songs and the singer were clever, the situation was interesting, and, somehow or other, I found my fingers more than once in contact with Maggie's, as I turned over the leaves of the music.

      At last the Provost rose, with a stertoracious grunt. I thought this might be the signal for retiring to rest; but such were not the habits of Dreepdaily. Salt herrings and finnan haddocks were produced along with the hot water and accompaniments; and I presume it was rather late before my host conducted me to my chamber. If I dreamed at all that night, it must have been of Margaret Binkie.

      CHAPTER III

      The next morning, whilst dressing, I heard a blithe voice carolling on the stair. It was the orison of Margaret Binkie as she descended to the breakfast-room. I listened and caught the following verses: —

      "O hand away frae me," she said,

      "I pray you let me be!

      Hae you the shares ye held, my lord,

      What time ye courted me?

      "'Tis woman's weird to luve and pine,

      And man's is to forget:

      Hold you the shares, Lord James," she said,

      "Or hae ye sold them yet?"

      "My York Extensions, bought at par,

      I sold at seven pund prem. —

      And, O my heart is sair to think

      I had nae mair of them!"

      "That is really a remarkable girl!" thought I, as I stropped my razor. "Such genius, such animation, and such a thorough knowledge of the market! She would make a splendid wife for a railway-director."

      "Come away, Mr Dunshunner," said the Provost,

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