The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete

I’m seen on the causeway—I’m seen on the down;
The lightning that flashes so bright and so free,
Is scarcely so blithe or so bonny as me.”

“Hand your tongue, ye skirling limmer!” said the officer who had acted as master of the ceremonies to this extraordinary performer, and who was rather scandalised at the freedom of her demeanour before a person of Mr. Sharpitlaw’s importance—“haud your tongue, or I’se gie ye something to skirl for!”

“Let her alone, George,” said Sharpitlaw, “dinna put her out o’ tune; I hae some questions to ask her—But first, Mr. Butler, take another look of her.”

“Do sae, minister—do sae,” cried Madge; “I am as weel worth looking at as ony book in your aught.—And I can say the single carritch, and the double carritch, and justification, and effectual calling, and the assembly of divines at Westminster, that is” (she added in a low tone), “I could say them ance—but it’s lang syne—and ane forgets, ye ken.” And poor Madge heaved another deep sigh.

“Weel, sir,” said Mr. Sharpitlaw to Butler, “what think ye now?”

“As I did before,” said Butler; “that I never saw the poor demented creature in my life before.”

“Then she is not the person whom you said the rioters last night described as Madge Wildfire?”

“Certainly not,” said Butler. “They may be near the same height, for they are both tall, but I see little other resemblance.”

“Their dress, then, is not alike?” said Sharpitlaw.

“Not in the least,” said Butler.

“Madge, my bonny woman,” said Sharpitlaw, in the same coaxing manner, “what did ye do wi’ your ilka-day’s claise yesterday?”

“I dinna mind,” said Madge.

“Where was ye yesterday at e’en, Madge?”

“I dinna mind ony thing about yesterday,” answered Madge; “ae day is eneugh for ony body to wun ower wi’ at a time, and ower muckle sometimes.”

“But maybe, Madge, ye wad mind something about it, if I was to gie ye this half-crown?” said Sharpitlaw, taking out the piece of money.

“That might gar me laugh, but it couldna gar me mind.”

“But, Madge,” continued Sharpitlaw, “were I to send you to the workhouse in Leith Wynd, and gar Jock Daigleish lay the tawse on your back—”

“That wad gar me greet,” said Madge, sobbing, “but it couldna gar me mind, ye ken.”

“She is ower far past reasonable folks’ motives, sir,” said Ratcliffe, “to mind siller, or John Daigleish, or the cat-and-nine-tails either; but I think I could gar her tell us something.”

“Try her, then, Ratcliffe,” said Sharpitlaw, “for I am tired of her crazy pate, and be d—d to her.”

“Madge,” said Ratcliffe, “hae ye ony joes now?”

“An ony body ask ye, say ye dinna ken.—Set him to be speaking of my joes, auld Daddie Ratton!”

“I dare say, ye hae deil ane?”

“See if I haena then,” said Madge, with the toss of the head of affronted beauty—“there’s Rob the Ranter, and Will Fleming, and then there’s Geordie Robertson, lad—that’s Gentleman Geordie—what think ye o’ that?”

Ratcliffe laughed, and, winking to the procurator-fiscal, pursued the inquiry in his own way. “But, Madge, the lads only like ye when ye hae on your braws—they wadna touch you wi’ a pair o’ tangs when you are in your auld ilka-day rags.”

“Ye’re a leeing auld sorrow then,” replied the fair one; “for Gentle Geordie Robertson put my ilka-day’s claise on his ain bonny sell yestreen, and gaed a’ through the town wi’ them; and gawsie and grand he lookit, like ony queen in the land.”

“I dinna believe a word o’t,” said Ratcliffe, with another wink to the procurator. “Thae duds were a’ o’ the colour o’ moonshine in the water, I’m thinking, Madge—The gown wad be a sky-blue scarlet, I’se warrant ye?”

“It was nae sic thing,” said Madge, whose unretentive memory let out, in the eagerness of contradiction, all that she would have most wished to keep concealed, had her judgment been equal to her inclination. “It was neither scarlet nor sky-blue, but my ain auld brown threshie-coat of a short-gown, and my mother’s auld mutch, and my red rokelay—and he gied me a croun and a kiss for the use o’ them, blessing on his bonny face—though it’s been a dear ane to me.”

“And where did he change his clothes again, hinnie?” said Sharpitlaw, in his most conciliatory manner.

“The procurator’s spoiled a’,” observed Ratcliffe, drily. And it was even so; for the question, put in so direct a shape, immediately awakened Madge to the propriety of being reserved upon those very topics on which Ratcliffe had indirectly seduced her to become communicative.

“What was’t ye were speering at us, sir?” she resumed, with an appearance of stolidity so speedily assumed, as showed there was a good deal of knavery mixed with her folly.

“I asked you,” said the procurator, “at what hour, and to what place, Robertson brought back your clothes.”

“Robertson?—Lord hand a care o’ us! what Robertson?”

“Why, the fellow we were speaking of, Gentle Geordie, as you call him.”

“Geordie Gentle!” answered Madge, with well-feigned amazement—“I dinna ken naebody they ca’ Geordie Gentle.”

“Come, my jo,” said Sharpitlaw, “this will not do; you must tell us what you did with these clothes of yours.”

Madge Wildfire made no answer, unless the question may seem connected with the snatch of a song with which she indulged the embarrassed investigator:—

“What did ye wi’ the bridal ring—bridal ring—bridal ring?
What did ye wi’ your wedding ring, ye little cutty quean, O?
I gied it till a sodger, a sodger, a sodger,
I gied it till a sodger, an auld true love o’ mine, O.”

Of all the madwomen who have sung and said, since the days of Hamlet the Dane, if Ophelia be the most affecting, Madge Wildfire was the most provoking.

The procurator-fiscal was in despair. “I’ll take some measures with this d—d Bess of Bedlam,” said he, “that shall make her find her tongue.”

“Wi’ your favour, sir,” said Ratcliffe, “better let her mind settle a little—Ye have aye made out something.”

“True,” said the official person; “a brown short-gown, mutch, red rokelay—that agrees with your Madge Wildfire, Mr. Butler?” Butler agreed that it did so. “Yes, there was a sufficient motive for taking this crazy creature’s dress and name, while he was about such a job.”

“And I am free to say now,” said Ratcliffe

“When you see it has come out without you,” interrupted Sharpitlaw.

“Just sae, sir,” reiterated Ratcliffe. “I am free to say now, since it’s come out otherwise, that these were the clothes I saw Robertson wearing last night in the jail, when he was at the head of the rioters.”

“That’s direct evidence,” said Sharpitlaw; “stick to that, Rat—I will report favourably of you to the provost, for I have business for you to-night. It wears late; I must home and get a snack, and I’ll be back in the evening. Keep Madge with you, Ratcliffe, and try to get her into a good tune again.” So saying he left the prison.

CHAPTER SIXTEENTH

And some they whistled—and some they sang,