What it is, is nae beesiness of yours. The dog was a
sma' young terrier of the Highland breed, but with a drop to his
ears and a crinkle in his frosty coat--no' just an ordinar' dog.
I know him weel. He came to my place to be fed, near dead of
hunger, then led me here. If his master lies in this kirkyard,
I'll tak' the bit dog awa' with me."
Mr. Traill's astonishing fluency always carried all walls of
resistance before it with men of slower wit and speech. Only a
superior man could brush time-honored rules aside so curtly and
stand on his human rights so surely. James Brown pulled his
bonnet off deferentially, scratched his shock head and shifted
his pipe. Finally he admitted:
"Weel, there was a bit tyke i' the kirkyaird twa days syne. I put
'im oot, an' haena seen 'im aboot ony main" He offered, however,
to show the new-made mound on which he had found the dog. Leading
the way past the church, he went on down the terraced slope,
prolonging the walk with conversation, for the guardianship of an
old churchyard offers very little such lively company as John
Traill's.
"I mind, noo, it was some puir body frae the Coogate, wi' no' ony
mourners but the sma' terrier aneath the coffin. I let 'im pass,
no' to mak' a disturbance at a buryin'. The deal box was fetched
up by the police, an' carried by sic a crew o' gaol-birds as wad
mak' ye turn ower in yer ain God's hole. But he paid for his
buryin' wi' his ain siller, an' noo lies as canny as the
nobeelity.
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