"

But she was not content with the cessation of the old; she was
determined on bringing in the new. For a twelvemonth now she had urged
her husband to be rid of Gourlay. The country was opening up, she said,
and the quarry ought to be their own. A dozen times he had promised her
to warn Gourlay that he must yield the quarry when his tack ran out at
the end of the year, and a dozen times he had shrunk from the encounter.

"I'll write," he said feebly.

"Write!" said she, lowered in her pride to think her husband was a
coward. "Write, indeed! Man, have ye no spunk? Think what he has made
out o' ye! Think o' the money that has gone to him that should have come
to you! You should be glad o' the chance to tell him o't. My certy, if I
was you I wouldn't miss it for the world--just to let him know of his
cheatry! Oh, it's very right that _I_"--she sounded the _I_ big and
brave--"it's very right that _I_ should live in this tumbledown hole
while _he_ builds a palace from your plunder! It's right that _I_ should
put up with this"--she flung hands of contempt at her dwelling--"it's
right that _I_ should put up with this, while yon trollop has a
splendid mansion on the top o' the brae! And every bawbee of his
fortune has come out of you--the fool makes nothing from his other
business--he would have been a pauper if he hadn't met a softie like you
that he could do what he liked with. Write, indeed! I have no patience
with a wheen sumphs of men! Them do the work o' the world! They may wear
the breeks, but the women wear the brains, I trow. I'll have it out with
the black brute myself," screamed the hardy dame, "if you're feared of
his glower. If you havena the pluck for it, _I_ have. Write, indeed! In
you go to the meeting that oald ass of a Provost has convened, and don't
show your face in Templandmuir till you have had it out with Gourlay!"

No wonder the Templar looked subdued.

When Gourlay came forward with his usual calculated heartiness, the
laird remembered his wife and felt very uncomfortable. It was ill to
round on a man who always imposed on him a hearty and hardy
good-fellowship. Gourlay, greeting him so warmly, gave him no excuse for
an outburst. In his dilemma he turned to the children, to postpone the
evil hour.

"Ay, man, John!" he said heavily, "you're there!" Heavy Scotsmen are
fond of telling folk that they are where they are. "You're there!" said
Templandmuir.

"Ay," said John, the simpleton, "I'm here."