The progress of Ailie and Tammy through
the tenements was like that of the piper through Hamelin. The
children gathered and gathered, and followed at their heels,
until a curiously quiet mob of threescore or more crouched in the
court of the old hall of the Knights of St. John, in the
Grassmarket, to count the many copper coins in Tammy's woolen
bonnet.
"Five shullin's, ninepence, an' a ha'penny," Tammy announced. And
then, after calculation on his fingers, "It'll tak' a shullin'
an' twapenny ha'penny mair."
There was a gasping breath of bitter disappointment, and one wee
laddie wailed for lost Bobby. At that Ailie dashed the tears from
her own eyes and sprang up, spurred to desperate effort. She
would storm the all but hopeless attic chambers. Up the twisting
turnpike stairs on the outer wall she ran, to where the swallows
wheeled about the cornices, and she could hear the iron cross of
the Knights Templars creak above the gable. Then, all the way
along a dark passage, at one door after another, she knocked, and
cried,
"Do ye ken Greyfriars Bobby?"
At some of the doors there was no answer. At others students
stared out at the bairn, not in the least comprehending this wild
crying. Tears of anger and despair flooded the little maid's blue
eyes when she beat on the last door of the row with her doubled
fist.
"Do ye ken Greyfriars Bobby? The police are gangin' to mak' 'im
be deid--" As the door was flung open she broke into stormy
weeping.
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