of a hang-dog look.

"Mackellar," says he, "I wish I could trouble you upon a little

service. There is a pension we pay; it is John's part to carry it,

and now that he is sick I know not to whom I should look unless it

was yourself. The matter is very delicate; I could not carry it

with my own hand for a sufficient reason; I dare not send

Macconochie, who is a talker, and I am - I have - I am desirous

this should not come to Mrs. Henry's ears," says he, and flushed to

his neck as he said it.

To say truth, when I found I was to carry money to one Jessie

Broun, who was no better than she should be, I supposed it was some

trip of his own that Mr. Henry was dissembling. I was the more

impressed when the truth came out.

It was up a wynd off a side street in St. Bride's that Jessie had

her lodging. The place was very ill inhabited, mostly by the

freetrading sort. There was a man with a broken head at the entry;

half-way up, in a tavern, fellows were roaring and singing, though

it was not yet nine in the day. Altogether, I had never seen a

worse neighbourhood, even in the great city of Edinburgh, and I was

in two minds to go back. Jessie's room was of a piece with her

surroundings, and herself no better. She would not give me the

receipt (which Mr. Henry had told me to demand, for he was very

methodical) until she had sent out for spirits, and I had pledged

her in a glass; and all the time she carried on in a light-headed,

reckless way - now aping the manners of a lady, now breaking into

unseemly mirth, now making coquettish advances that oppressed me to

<<BackPagesTo menuNext>>