Protocol, who had no wish to increase at that moment the odium attached to his office--"and now, gentlemen, I fancy we have no more to wait for here, and--I shall put the settlement of my excellent and worthy friend on record to-morrow, that every gentleman may examine the contents, and have free access to take an extract; and"--he proceeded to lock up the repositories of the deceased with more speed than he had opened them--"Mrs. Rebecca, ye'll be so kind as to keep all right here until we can let the house--I had an offer from a tenant this morning, if such a thing should be, and if I was to have any management."Our friend Dinmont, having had his hopes as well as another, had hitherto sat sulky enough in the armchair formerly appropriated to the deceased, and in which she would have been not a little scandalised to have seen this colossal specimen of the masculine gender lolling at length. His employment had been rolling up, into the form of a coiled snake, the long lash of his horsewhip, and then by a jerk causing it to unroll itself into the middle of the floor. The first words he said when he had digested the shock, contained a magnanimous declaration, which he probably was not conscious of having uttered aloud--"Weel-blude's thicker than water--she's welcome to the cheeses and the hams just the same."But when the trustee had made the above-mentioned motion for the mourners to depart, and talked of the house being immediately let, honest Dinmont got upon his feet, and stunned the company with this blunt question, "And what's to come o' this poor lassie then, Jenny Gibson? Sae mony o' us as thought oursells sib to the family when the gear was parting, we may do something for her amang us surely."This proposal seemed to dispose most of the assembly instantly to evacuate the premises, although upon Mr. Protcol's motion they had lingered as if around the grave of their disappointed hopes.
Drumquag said, or rather muttered, something of having a family of his own, and took precedence, in virtue of his gentle blood, to depart as fast as possible. The tobacconist sturdily stood forward, and scouted the motion--"A little huzzie, like that, was weel eneugh provided for already; and Mr. Protocol at ony rate was the proper person to take direction of her, as he had charge of her legacy;" and after uttering such his opinion in a steady and decisive tone of voice, he also left the place. The buck made a stupid and brutal attempt at a jest upon Mrs. Bertram's recommendation that the poor girl should be taught some honest trade; but encountered a scowl from Colonel Mannering's darkening eye (to whom, in his ignorance of the tone of good society, he had looked for applause) that made him ache to the very backbone. He shuffled downstairs, therefore, as fast as possible.
Protocol, who was really a good sort of man, next expressed his intention to take a temporary charge of the young lady, under protest always, that his so doing should be considered as merely eleemosynary; when Dinmont at length got up, and, having shaken his huge dreadnought greatcoat, as a Newfoundland dog does his shaggy hide when he comes out of the water, ejaculated, "Weel, deil hae me then, if ye hae ony fash [*Trouble] wi' her, Mr. Protocol, if she likes to gang hame wi' me, that is. Ye see, Ailie and me we're weel to pass, and we would like the lassies to hae a wee bit mair lair than oursells, and to be neighbour-like--that wad we. --And ye see Jenny canna miss but to ken manners, and the like o' reading books, and sewing seams--having lived sae lang wi' a grand lady like Lady Singleside; or if she disna ken onything about it, I'm jealous that our bairns will like her a' the better. And I'll take care o' the bits o' claes, and what spending siller she maun hae, so the--hundred pound may rin on in your hands, Mr. Protocol, and I'll be adding something till't, till she'll maybe get a Liddesdale joe that wants something to help to buy the hirsel. [*The stock of sheep]--What d'ye say to that, hinny? I'll take out a ticket for ye in the fly to Jethart--odd, but ye maun take a powny after that o'er the Limestane-rig--deil a wheeled carriage ever gaed into Liddesdale. [*The roads of Liddesdale, in Dandie Dinmont's days, could not he said to exist, and the district was only accessible through a succession of tremendous morasses. About thirty years ago, the author himself was the first person who ever drove a little open carriage into these wilds: the excellent roads by which they are now traversed being then in some progress. The people stared with no small wonder at a sight which many of them had never witnessed in their lives before. ]--And I'll be very glad if Mrs.
Rebecca comes wi' you, hinny, and stays a month or twa while ye're stranger like."While Mrs. Rebecca was curtseying, and endeavouring to make the poor orphan girl curtsey instead of crying, and while Dandie, in his rough way, was encouraging them both, old Pleydell had recourse to his snuff-box. It's meat and drink to me, now, Colonel," he said, as he recovered himself, "to see a clown like this--I must gratify him in his own way,--must assist him to ruin himself--there's no help for it. Here, you Liddesdale--Dandie--Charlies-hope-what do they call you?"The farmer turned, infinitely gratified even by this sort of notice; for in his heart, next to his own landlord, he honoured a lawyer in high practice.
