despair. It
grew to be high day at last, perhaps nine in the forenoon; and I was
worn with these wanderings, and chanced to have stopped in front of a
very good house on the landward side, a house with beautiful, clear
glass windows, flowering knots upon the sills, the walls new-harled,[33]
and a chase-dog sitting yawning on the step like one that was at home.
Well, I was even envying this dumb brute, when the door fell open and
there issued forth a shrewd, ruddy, kindly, consequential man in a
well-powdered wig and spectacles. I was in such a plight that no one set
eyes on me once, but he looked at me again; and this gentleman, as it
proved, was so much struck with my poor appearance that he came straight
up to me and asked me what I did.

I told him I was come to the Queen's Ferry on business, and taking heart
of grace, asked him to direct me to the house of Mr. Rankeillor.

"Why," said he, "that is his house that I have just come out of; and,
for a rather singular chance, I am that very man."

"Then, sir," said I, "I have to beg the favour of an interview."

"I do not know your name," said he, "nor yet your face."

"My name is David Balfour," said I.

"David Balfour?" he repeated, in rather a high tone, like one surprised.
"And where have you come from, Mr. David Balfour?" he asked, looking me
pretty drily in the face.

"I have come from a great many strange places, sir," said I; "but I
think it would be as well to tell you where and how in a more private
manner."

He seemed to muse a while, holding his lip in his hand, and looking now
at me and now upon the causeway of the street.

"Yes," says he, "that will be the best, no doubt." And he led me back
with him into his house, cried out to some one whom I could not see that
he would be engaged all morning, and brought me into a little dusty
chamber, full of books and documents. Here he sat down, and bade me be
seated; though I thought he looked a little ruefully from his clean
chair to my muddy rags. "And now," says he, "if you have any business,
pray be brief and come swiftly to the point. _Nec gemino bellum Trojanum
orditur ab ovo_--do you understand that?" says he, with a keen look.

"I will even do as Horace says, sir," I answered, smiling, "and carry
you in _medias res_." He nodded as if he was well pleased, and indeed
his scrap of Latin had been set to test me. For all that, and though I
was somewhat encouraged, the blood came in my face when I added