“Ye can du as yer lordship likes,” answered Miss Horn, “but I wadna hae ‘t said o’ me ‘at I had ony dealin’s wi’ her.  Wha kens but she micht say ye tried to bribe her?  There’s naething she wad bogle at gien she thoucht it worth her while.  No ’at I ’m feart at her.  Lat her lee!  I’m no sae blate but—­Only dinna lippen till a word she says, my lord.”

The marquis hesitated.  “I wonder whether the real source of my perplexity occurs to you, Miss Horn,” he said at length.  “You know I have a daughter?”

“Weel eneuch that, my lord.”

“By my second marriage.”

“Nae merridge ava’, my lord.”

“True, if I confess to the first.”

“A’ the same whether or no, my lord.”

“Then you see,” the marquis went on, refusing offence, “what the admission of your story would make of my daughter?”

“That’s plain eneuch, my lord.”

“Now, if I have read Malcolm right he has too much regard for his—­mistress—­to put her in such a false position.”

“That is, my lord, ye wad hae yer lawfu’ son beir the lawless name.”

“No, no:  it need never come out what he is.  I will provide for him—­as a gentleman, of course.”

“It canna be, my lord.  Ye can du naething for him, wi’ that face o’ his, but oot comes the trouth as to the father o’ ‘im; an’ it wadna be lang afore the tale was ekit oot wi’ the name o’ his mither—­Mistress Catanach wad see to that, gien ‘twas only to spite me—­an’ I wunna hae my Grizel ca’d what she is not for ony lord’s dauchter i’ the three kynriks.”

“What does it matter, now she’s dead and gone?” said the marquis, false to the dead in his love for the living.

“Deid an’ gane, my lord?  What ca’ ye deid an’ gane?  Maybe the great anes o’ the yerth get sic a forlethie (surfeit) o’ grand’ur ’at they’re for nae mair, an’ wad perish like the brute beast.  For onything I ken, they may hae their wuss, but for mysel’, I wad warstle to haud my sowl waukin’ (awake) i’ the verra article o’ deith, for the bare chance o’ seein’ my bonny Grizel again.  It’s a mercy I hae nae feelin’s,” she added, arresting her handkerchief on its way to her eyes, and refusing to acknowledge the single tear that ran down her cheek.

Plainly she was not like any of the women whose characters the marquis had accepted as typical of womankind.

“Then you won’t leave the matter to her husband and son?” he said reproachfully.

“I tellt ye, my lord, I wad du naething but what I saw to be richt.  Lat this affair oot o’ my han’s I daurna.  That laad ye micht work to onything ‘at made agane himsel’.  He’s jist like his puir mither there.”

“If Miss Campbell was his mother,” said the marquis.

“Miss Cam’ell!” cried Miss Horn.  “I’ll thank yer lordship to ca’ her by her ain, an’ that’s Lady Lossie.”

What of the something ruinous heart of the marquis was habitable was occupied by his daughter, and had no accommodation at present either for his dead wife or his living son.  Once more he sat thinking in silence for a while.  “I’ll make Malcolm a post-captain in the navy and give you a thousand pounds,” he said at length, hardly knowing that he spoke.