Guy Mannering, Or, the Astrologer — Volume 02 by Sir Walter Scott
page 295 of 352 (83%)
page 295 of 352 (83%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
seat, if every step was on a dead man. I have keepit that oath
too. I will be ae step mysell, he (pointing to Hatteraick) will soon be another, and there will be ane mair yet.' The clergyman, now interposing, remarked it was a pity this deposition was not regularly taken and written down, and the surgeon urged the necessity of examining the wound, previously to exhausting her by questions. When she saw them removing Hatteraick, in order to clear the room and leave the surgeon to his operations, she called out aloud, raising herself at the same time upon the couch, 'Dirk Hatteraick, you and I will never meet again until we are before the judgment-seat; will ye own to what I have said, or will you dare deny it?' He turned his hardened brow upon her, with a look of dumb and inflexible defiance. 'Dirk Hatteraick, dare ye deny, with my blood upon your hands, one word of what my dying breath is uttering?' He looked at her with the same expression of hardihood and dogged stubbornness, and moved his lips, but uttered no sound. 'Then fareweel!' she said, 'and God forgive you! your hand has sealed my evidence. When I was in life I was the mad randy gipsy, that had been scourged and banished and branded; that had begged from door to door, and been hounded like a stray tyke from parish to parish; wha would hae minded HER tale? But now I am a dying woman, and my words will not fall to the ground, any more than the earth will cover my blood!' She here paused, and all left the hut except the surgeon and two or three women. After a very short examination he shook his head and resigned his post by the dying woman's side to the clergyman. A chaise returning empty to Kippletringan had been stopped on the |
|