“A guid innins, you muckle black-hearted brute!” she cried.  “By heavens, an’ I’ll see that you get yours afore I hae done wi’ you.  Dinna think though I hae been saft wi’ you a’ along, that I’ll ay be like that.  Oh, no, I can stand a lot; but you’ll find oot that Mag Robertson hasna selt her a’ tae you, without driving a hard bargain afore she lets you alone.  You can gang back to your tippy wee baggage!  Gang to hell, baith you an’ her, an’ joy be wi’ you baith!  But I’ll put a sprag in your wheel afore you gang far.  Mind that!  By ——­ I will!  She’ll nae toss her heid as she gangs past me as if I was dirt.  Her, an’ her fine dresses that she never payed for wi’ money an’ her fal-lals.  By heaven!  But you hae a fine taste!” She finished up exasperated beyond all control by his coolness.

“Ay, it wad seem so,” he laughed brutally.  “When I look at you, I begin to wonder what the hell I was lookin’ at.  You’re like a damnationed big lump o’ creesh,” and he laughed in her face, knowing this would rouse her more than ever.  Then as she choked and spluttered in her anger he said:  “But what the hell odds is’t to you, you baggage?” and his eyes and voice were cold and brutal beyond expression.  “Leebie Granger is young,” he went on insultingly, in a collected even voice which he strove to make jaunty in tone.  “She’s as fresh an’ young.  An’ you’re auld, an’ fat an’ as ugly as hell, an’ if I dae gang to Leebie you hae damn all to dae wi’ it.  As I said, you’ve had your innin’s, an’ been gey well paid for it, an’ I dinna gie a damn for you.”

“Dae you no’?” she cried now livid with anger and losing all control over her words and actions, her eyes flashing with maddened rage and the froth working from her lips.  “I’ll let you ken or no’.  I’ll tear the pented face off your new doll; and I’ll sort you too, you dirty black brute that you are.”

“Gang to hell!” he shouted, starting out of the door so suddenly that he almost ran into the next door neighbor who hearing the noise had crept noiselessly on tiptoe to the door the better to hear all that was going on.

“What the hell’s wrang wi’ you?” he demanded turning in rage upon the eavesdropper.  “Have you naething else to dae than that?  Gang in an’ get your dirty midden o’ a hoose cleaned an’ I’ll see that you don’t stay lang in Lowwood to spy on ony mair folk!” and cowering in shame the poor woman backed into the door and shut it, making up her mind that her man would be sacked that day, and wondering where they would flit to, so as to find work and a house.

Walker strode up the row with Mag Robertson shouting behind him and the neighbors all coming to the doors as they passed, and craning their necks, while keeping their bodies safe hidden within the doorways of their homes.

“We’re surely gettin’ an entertainment the day,” observed one fat old woman to another woman two doors away, as they both looked after Mag as she followed Walker up the row, shouting her worst names at him, and vowing what she’d do with Leebie Granger, when she got hands on her.