"
"Weel, Phemy, ye're busy!" said Malcolm.
"Ay," answered the child, without looking up. The manner was not
courteous, but her voice was gentle and sweet.
"What are ye doin' there?" he asked.
"Makin' a string o' beads, to weir at aunty's merriage."
"What are ye makin' them o'?" he went on.
"Haddicks' een."
"Are they a' haddicks'?"
"Na, there's some cods' amo' them; but they're maistly haddicks'.
I pikes them out afore they're sautit, an' biles them; an' syne I
polish them i' my han's till they're rale bonny."
"Can ye tell me onything about the mad laird, Phemy?" asked Malcolm,
in his anxiety too abruptly.
"Ye can gang an' speir at my father: he's oot aboot," she answered,
with a sort of marked coolness, which, added to the fact that
she had never looked him in the face, made him more than suspect
something behind.
"Div ye ken onything aboot him?" he therefore insisted.
"Maybe I div, an' maybe I divna," answered the child, with an
expression of determined mystery.
"Ye'll tell me whaur ye think he is, Phemy?"
"Na, I winna."
"What for no?"
"Ow, jist for fear ye sud ken."
"But I'm a freen' till him."
"Ye may think ay, an' the laird may think no."
"Does he think you a freen', Phemy?" asked Malcolm, in the hope of
coming at something by widening the sweep of the conversation.
"Ay, he kens I'm a freen'," she replied.
"An' do ye aye ken whaur he is?"
"Na, no aye. He gangs here an' he gangs there--jist as he likes.
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