FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188  
189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   204   205   206   207   208   209   210   211   212   213   >>   >|  
rdinary requests. "Come in and tell me all about it." The little, broad figure stepped within the doorway. "I'm a' wat wi' the rain," again quoth the elfish voice, more genially, "an' I'm no' fit to gang into a gentleman's hoose." "Come into the dining-room," said the minister kindly. "'Deed, an' ye'll no," interposed Betsy, who had been coming nearer. "Ye'se juist gang into the study, an' I'll lay doon a bass for ye to stand an' dreep on. Where come ye frae, laddie?" "I am Tammas Gleg's laddie. My faither disna ken that I hae come to see the minister," said the boy. "The loon's no' wise!" muttered Betsy. "Could the back door no' hae served ye?--Bringing fowk away through the hoose traikin' to open the front door to you on sic a nicht! Man, ye are a peetifu' object!" The object addressed looked about him. He was making a circle of wetness on the floor. He was taken imperatively by the coat-sleeve. "Ye canna gang into the study like that. There wad be nae dryin' the floor. Come into the kitchen, laddie," said Betsy. "Gang yer ways ben, minister, to your ain gate-end, an' the loon'll be wi' ye the noo." So Betsy, who was accustomed to her own way in the manse of Blawrinnie, drove Tammas Gleg's laddie before her into the kitchen, and the minister went into the study with a kind of junior apostolic meekness. Then he meditatively settled his hard circular collar, which he wore in the interests of Life and Work, but privately hated with a deadly hatred, as his particular form of penance. It was no very long season that he had to wait, and before he had done more than again lift up his interesting "authority," the door of the study was pushed open and Betsy cried in, "Here he's!" lest there might be any trouble in the identification. And not without some reason. For, strange as was the figure which had stepped into the minister's lobby out of the storm, the vision which now met his eyes was infinitely stranger. A thick-set body little over four and a half feet high, exceedingly thick and stout, was surmounted with one of the most curious heads the minister had ever seen. He saw a round apple face, eyes of extraordinary brightness, a thin-lipped mouth which seemed to meander half-way round the head as if uncertain where to stop. Betsy had arrayed this "object" in a pink bed-gown of her own, a pair of the minister's trousers turned up nearly to the knee in a roll the thickness of a man's wrist, and one of
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188  
189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   204   205   206   207   208   209   210   211   212   213   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

minister

 

laddie

 

object

 

Tammas

 

kitchen

 

stepped

 
figure
 

reason

 
trouble
 
identification

collar

 
season
 
interests
 

hatred

 
deadly
 

privately

 
penance
 

interesting

 
authority
 

pushed


uncertain

 
meander
 

brightness

 

extraordinary

 

lipped

 

arrayed

 

thickness

 

turned

 

trousers

 

stranger


infinitely

 

strange

 

vision

 
curious
 
surmounted
 

circular

 

exceedingly

 

faither

 

served

 

Bringing


muttered

 

nearer

 
coming
 

doorway

 
rdinary
 
requests
 

elfish

 
kindly
 
interposed
 

dining