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Eh, man, whaes denying it? said my uncle. Pit it as ye please, haet your ain way; Ill do naething to cross ye. Just tell me what like yell be wanting, and yell see that well can agree fine. Troth, sir, said Alan, I ask for nothing but plain dealing. In two words: do ye want the lad killed or kept? O, sirs! cried Ebenezer. O, sirs, me! thats no kind of language! Killed or kept! repeated Alan. O, keepit, keepit! wailed my uncle. Well have nae bloodshed, if you please. Well, says Alan, as ye please; thatll be the dearer. The dearer? cries Ebenezer. Would ye fyle your hands wi crime? Hoot! said Alan, theyre baith crime, whatever! And the killings easier, and quicker, and surer. Keeping the ladll be a fashious2 job, a fashious, kittle business.Ill have him keepit, though, returned my uncle. I never had naething to do with onything morally wrong; and Im no gaun to begin to pleasure a wild Hielandman. Yere unco scrupulous, sneered Alan. Im a man o principle, said Ebenezer, simply; and if I have to pay for it, Ill have to pay for it. And besides, says he, ye forget the lads my brothers son. Well, well, said Alan, and now about the price. Its no very easy for me to set a name upon it; I would first have to ken some small matters. I would have to ken, for instance, what ye gave Hoseason at the first off-go? Hoseason! cries my uncle, struck aback. What for? For kidnapping David, says Alan. Its a lee, its a black lee! cried my uncle. He was never kidnapped. He leed in his throat that tauld ye that. Kidnapped? He never was! Thats no fault of mine nor yet of yours, said Alan; nor yet of Hoseasons, if hes a man that can be trusted. What do ye mean? cried Ebenezer. Did Hoseason tell ye? Why, ye donnered auld runt, how else would I ken? cried Alan. Hoseason and me are partners; we gang shares; so ye can see for yoursel what good ye can do leeing. And I must plainly say ye drove a fools bargain when ye let a man like the sailor-man so far forward in your private matters. But thats past praying for; and ye must lie on your bed the way ye made it. And the point in hand is just this: what did ye pay him? Has he tauld ye himsel? asked my uncle. Thats my concern, said Alan. Weel, said my uncle, I dinnae care what he said, he leed, and the solemn Gods truth is this, that I gave him twenty pound. But Ill be perfecly honest with ye: forby that, he was to have the selling of the lad in Caroliny, whilk would be as muckle mair, but no from my pocket, ye see. |
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