A certain person has better friends among them
than you wot of, and can serve a friend when it is least likely."
"Pshaw!" answered Hayston, who perfectly knew and thoroughly despised
the character of this man, "none of your cogging gibberish; tell me
truly, are you at liberty and in safety?"
"Free and safe as a Whig bailie on the causeway of his own borough, or a
canting Presbyterian minister in his own pulpit; and I came to tell you
that you need not remain in hiding any longer."
"Then I suppose you call yourself my friend, Captain Craigengelt?" said
Bucklaw.
"Friend!" replied Craigengelt, "my cock of the pit! why, I am thy very
Achates, man, as I have heard scholars say--hand and glove--bark and
tree--thine to life and death!"
"I'll try that in a moment," answered Bucklaw. "Thou art never without
money, however thou comest by it. Lend me two pieces to wash the dust
out of these honest fellows' throats in the first place, and then----"
"Two pieces! Twenty are at thy service, my lad, and twenty to back
them."
"Ay, say you so?" said Bucklaw, pausing, for his natural penetration led
him to suspect some extraordinary motive lay couched under an excess of
generosity.
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