The House with the Green Shutters. George Douglas Brown
grunted Gourlay, as if there was something wrong with the Deacon.
"We wath wanting to thee ye on a very important matter, Mithter Gourlay," lisped the Deacon, smiling up at the big man's face, with his head on one side, and rubbing his fingers in front of him. "It'th a matter of the common good, you thee; and we all agreed that we should speak to you, ath the foremost merchant of the town!"
Allardyce meant his compliment to fetch Gourlay. But Gourlay knew his Allardyce, and was cautious. It was well to be on your guard when the Deacon was complimentary. When his language was most flowery there was sure to be a serpent hidden in it somewhere. He would lisp out an innocent remark and toddle away, and Gourlay would think nothing of the matter till a week afterwards, perhaps, when something would flash a light; then "Damn him, did he mean 'that'?" he would seethe, starting back and staring at the "that" while his fingers strangled the air in place of the Deacon.
He glowered at the Deacon now till the Deacon blinked.
"You thee, Mr. Gourlay," Allardyce shuffled uneasily, "it'th for your own benefit just ath much ath ourth. We were thinking of you ath well ath of ourthelves! Oh yeth, oh yeth!"
"Ay, man!" said Gourlay, "that was kind of ye! I'll be the first man in Barbie to get ainy benefit from the fools that mismanage our affairs."
The gravel grated beneath the Provost's foot. The atmosphere was becoming electric, and the Deacon hastened to the point.
"You thee, there'th a fine natural supply of water—a perfect reservore the Provost sayth—on the brae-face just above your garden, Mr. Gourlay. Now, it would be easy to lead that water down and alang through all the gardenth on the high side of Main Street—and, 'deed, it might feed a pump at the Cross, too, to supply the lower portionth o' the town. It would really be a grai-ait convenience. Every man on the high side o' Main Street would have a running spout at his own back door! If your garden didna run tho far back, Mr. Gourlay, and ye hadna tho muckle land about your place"—that should fetch him, thought the Deacon—"if it werena for that, Mr. Gourlay, we could easily lead the water round to the other gardenth without interfering with your property. But, ath it ith, we simply can-noat move without ye. The water must come through your garden, if it comes at a-all."
"The most o' you important men live on the high side o' Main Street," birred Gourlay. "Is it the poor folk at the Cross, or your ain bits o' back doors that you're thinking o'?"
"Oh—oh, Mr. Gourlay!" protested Allardyce, head flung back, and palms in air, to keep the thought of self-interest away, "oh—oh, Mr. Gourlay! We're thinking of noathing but the common good, I do assure ye."
"Ay, man! You're dis-in-ter-ested!" said Gourlay, but he stumbled on the big word and spoiled the sneer. That angered him, and, "It's likely," he rapped out, "that I'll allow the land round my house to be howked and trenched and made a mudhole of to oblige a wheen things like you!"
"Oh—oh, but think of the convenience to uth—eh—eh—I mean to the common good," said Allardyce.
"I howked wells for myself," snapped Gourlay. "Let others do the like."
"Oh, but we haven't all the enterprithe of you, Mr. Gourlay. You'll surely accommodate the town!"
"I'll see the town damned first," said Gourlay, and passed on his steady way.
FOOTNOTE:
[3] Trauchle, a poor trollop who trails about; smeddum, grit.
CHAPTER VI.
The bodies watched Gourlay in silence until he was out of earshot. Then, "It's monstrous!" the Provost broke out in solemn anger; "I declare it's perfectly monstrous! But I believe we could get Pow-ers to compel him. Yass; I believe we could get Pow-ers. I do believe we could get Pow-ers."
The Provost was fond of talking about "Pow-ers," because it implied that he was intimate with the great authorities who might delegate such "Pow-ers" to him. To talk of "Pow-ers," mysteriously, was a tribute to his own importance. He rolled the word on his tongue as if he enjoyed the sound of it.
On the Deacon's cheek bones two red spots flamed, round and big as a Scotch penny. His was the hurt silence of the baffled diplomatist, to whom a defeat means reflections on his own ability.
"Demn him!" he skirled, following the solid march of his enemy with fiery eyes.
Never before had his deaconship been heard to swear. Tam Wylie laughed at the shrill oath till his eyes were buried in his merry wrinkles, a suppressed snirt, a continuous gurgle in the throat and nose, in beaming survey the while of the withered old creature dancing in his rage. (It was all a good joke to Tam, because, living on the outskirts of the town, he had no spigot of his own to feed.) The Deacon turned the eyes of hate on him. Demn Wylie too—what was he laughing at!
"Oh, I dare thay you could have got round him!" he snapped.
"In my opinion, Allardyce," said the baker, "you mismanaged the whole affair. Yon wasna the way to approach him!"
"It'th a pity you didna try your hand, then, I'm sure! No doubt a clever man like you would have worked wonderth!"
So the bodies wrangled among themselves. Somehow or other Gourlay had the knack of setting them by the ears. It was not till they hit on a common topic of their spite in railing at him that they became a band of brothers and a happy few.
"Whisht!" said Sandy Toddle suddenly; "here's his boy!"
John was coming towards them on his way to school. The bodies watched him as he passed, with the fixed look men turn on a boy of whose kinsmen they were talking even now. They affect a stony and deliberate regard, partly to include the newcomer in their critical survey of his family, and partly to banish from their own eyes any sign that they have just been running down his people. John, as quick as his mother to feel, knew in a moment they were watching him. He hung his head sheepishly and blushed, and the moment he was past he broke into a nervous trot, the bag of books bumping on his back as he ran.
"He's getting a big boy, that son of Gourlay's," said the Provost; "how oald will he be?"
"He's approaching twelve," said Johnny Coe, who made a point of being able to supply such news because it gained him consideration where he was otherwise unheeded. "He was born the day the brig on the Fleckie Road gaed down, in the year o' the great flood; and since the great flood it's twelve year come Lammas. Rab Tosh o' Fleckie's wife was heavy-footed at the time, and Doctor Munn had been a' nicht wi' her, and when he cam to Barbie Water in the morning it was roaring wide frae bank to brae; where the brig should have been there was naething but the swashing of the yellow waves. Munn had to drive a' the way round to the Fechars brig, and in parts o' the road the water was so deep that it lapped his horse's bellyband. A' this time Mrs. Gourlay was skirling in her pains and praying to God she micht dee. Gourlay had been a great crony o' Munn's, but he quarrelled him for being late; he had trysted him, ye see, for the occasion, and he had been twenty times at the yett to look for him. Ye ken how little he would stomach that; he was ready to brust wi' anger. Munn, mad for the want of sleep and wat to the bane, swüre back at him; and than Gourlay wadna let him near his wife! Ye mind what an awful day it was; the thunder roared as if the heavens were tumbling on the world, and the lichtnin sent the trees daudin on the roads, and folk hid below their beds and prayed—they thocht it was the Judgment! But Gourlay rammed his black stepper in the shafts, and drave like the devil o' hell to Skeighan Drone, where there was a young doctor. The lad was feared to come, but Gourlay swore by God that he should, and he garred him. In a' the countryside driving like his that day was never kenned or heard