At the words all the softness fled from the little man's face.
"Ye do me a wrang, lass; ye do indeed," he said, looking up at her with an assumed ingenuousness which, had she known him better, would have warned her to beware. "Gin I kent where the lad was I'd be the vairy first to let you, and the p'lice, ken it too; eh, Wullie! he! he!" He chuckled at his wit and rubbed his knees, regardless of the contempt blazing in the girl's face.
"I canna tell ye where he is now, but ye'd aiblins care to hear o' when I saw him last." He turned his chair the better to address her.
"Twas like so: I was sittin' in this vairy chair it was, asleep, when he crep' up behind an' lep' on ma back. I knew naethin' o't till I found masel' on the floor an' him kneelin' on me. I saw by the look on him he was set on finishin' me, so I said--"
The girl waved her hand at him, superbly disdainful.
"Yo' ken yo're lyin', ivery word o't," she cried.
The little man hitched his trousers, crossed his legs, and yawned.
"An honest lee for an honest purpose is a matter ony man may be proud of, as you'll ken by the time you're my years, ma lass."
The girl slowly crossed the room. At the door she turned.
"Then ye'll no tell me wheer he is?" she asked with a heart-breaking trill in her voice.
"On ma word, lass, I dinna ken," he cried, half passionately.
"On your word, Mr. M'Adam" she said with a quiet scorn in her voice that might have stung Iscariot.
The little man spun round in his chair, an angry red dyeing his cheeks. In another moment he was suave and smiling again.
"I canna tell ye where he is noo," he said, unctuously; "but aiblins, I could let ye know where he's gaein' to."
"Can yo'? will yo'?" cried the simple girl all unsuspecting. In a moment she was across the room and at his knees.
"Closer, and I'll whisper." The little ear, peeping from its nest of brown, was tremblingly approached to his lips. The little man lent forward and whispered one short, sharp word, then sat back, grinning, to watch the effect of his disclosure.
He had his revenge, an unworthy revenge on such a victim. And, watching the girl's face, the cruel disappointment merging in the heat of her indignation, he had yet enough nobility to regret his triumph.