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48 - Grey Man by S R Crockett · Grey Man

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  Speaker 1: Rocket, Chapter forty eight, The Finding of the Treasure of Kelwood.
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  Speaker 1: When I came to myself, the cave was filled with
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  Speaker 1: armed men and the confused clamor of voices. The torches
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  Speaker 1: spluttered and reeked, and I could feel that my naked
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  Speaker 1: body was covered with a woman's cloak. Wrapped well about me.
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  Speaker 1: Someone was binding up my head, And as she examined
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  Speaker 1: to see if all had been rightly done, I saw
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  Speaker 1: that it was Nell Kennedy. So I called her softly
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  Speaker 1: by her name, But she bade me not try to rise,
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  Speaker 1: and looked again to my head to see that it
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  Speaker 1: had no serious wound. Then came John the Earl, and
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  Speaker 1: asked how I did Whereupon, minding, as is my wont
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  Speaker 1: to have old time by the forelock, I spoke of
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  Speaker 1: his promise. Here, I said, is the murderer of John Muir.
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  Speaker 1: Here is the gang of monsters. And now I will
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  Speaker 1: put you in the way of obtaining the treasure of Kelwood,
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  Speaker 1: if you will fulfill the promise which you made to me.
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  Speaker 1: What was that? He said shortly? For though Earl John
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  Speaker 1: liked promising well enough, he was not so fond of
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  Speaker 1: performing if it cost him aught, As in this case,
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  Speaker 1: it was like to do, my sweetheart, here my knighthood
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  Speaker 1: and a suitable downsitting of land, said I, knowing that
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  Speaker 1: it was now or never with me. Then he demurred
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  Speaker 1: a little and hesitated, so that for a moment I
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  Speaker 1: thought all was lost. Your sweetheart, you shall have, he
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  Speaker 1: said at last. But the others are not in my gift,
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  Speaker 1: save a holding of land, perhaps which I can let
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  Speaker 1: you for a trifling return when it falls vacant. And
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  Speaker 1: so rejoiced was I to think of getting my last
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  Speaker 1: that I might have consented to this, But now was
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  Speaker 1: behind me, And upon pretense of arranging a knot of
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  Speaker 1: the bandage upon my forehead, she whispered in my ear
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  Speaker 1: threat him with telling the king about the treasure. So,
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  Speaker 1: knowing her wisdom, I obeyed her. Well. Then, Earl John said, I,
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  Speaker 1: if that be so, and a knighthood and suitable heritages
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  Speaker 1: are not in your power to bestow. Here at hand
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  Speaker 1: is the King, give me leave to speak with him.
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  Speaker 1: He is fond of treasure, and I can put a
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  Speaker 1: brave one under his hand. Hush, said the Earl, looking
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  Speaker 1: about him with apprehension, for the King was yet in
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  Speaker 1: the place with mar and Lennox, ordering the taking down
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  Speaker 1: and burying of the strange white, narrow shaped hams, and
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  Speaker 1: the other things that turned the gay squeamish folk that
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  Speaker 1: came with him pale and sick. Only to look upon them. Hush,
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  Speaker 1: he said again, above all things, beware what you say
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  Speaker 1: to the King. Show the Keelwood treasure to myself alone,
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  Speaker 1: and you shall have bar hill Ay and all Minnock's side,
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  Speaker 1: from the Rowan Tree to the forks of Truel. And
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  Speaker 1: I will even speak to the King about the knighting.
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  Speaker 1: Will your lordship please to declare it before witnesses, said I,
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  Speaker 1: nell prompting me as before, for my head was dazed,
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  Speaker 1: but hers was singularly clear. So he called to him
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  Speaker 1: certain honorable men of his name, and promised, faithfully. Are
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  Speaker 1: you content, said he? So, I said, Nellie, show them
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  Speaker 1: the treasure. Here is the key. And she rose and
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  Speaker 1: took them to the box, which, by the blessing of God,
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  Speaker 1: remained still where we had left it in the recess.
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  Speaker 1: And she fitted the key in the lock, and it
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  Speaker 1: turned without a sound. And there the Earl bathed his
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  Speaker 1: hands in the set jewels, the loose stones of price
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  Speaker 1: and the coin of golden money, plashing them through his
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  Speaker 1: fingers with a sound like a spout of water, till
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  Speaker 1: for fear of the king, I advised him to close
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  Speaker 1: it again. It is worth the bargain, said he, though
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  Speaker 1: I am sorry to have promised away fair minoxide, I
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  Speaker 1: trow it was woman's wit that guided you in the asking,
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  Speaker 1: and not that thick bandaged headpiece of thine Launcelot Kennedy.
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  Speaker 1: But I answered, not knowing how to leave well alone
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  Speaker 1: when a man is pleased with himself. So the Earl
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  Speaker 1: placed Robert Harburg to guard the chest and to lie
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  Speaker 1: discreetly concerning it if any of the king's men should
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  Speaker 1: come near, saying that it was but some foulness appropriate
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  Speaker 1: to the den. But none came asking, and thus was
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  Speaker 1: the treasure of Kelwood conquest forever to the family of Cascillus.
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  Speaker 1: As for sawni Beans's monstrous brood, is it not recorded
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  Speaker 1: how they were carried through the country to Edinburgh, and
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  Speaker 1: as how they went, the folk flocked in from leagues
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  Speaker 1: away to see and execrate them. They were hurried straight
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  Speaker 1: to the sands of Leith, where, without process of trial
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  Speaker 1: or pleading, and in the manner prescribed for such fiends,
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  Speaker 1: they were executed out of hand as enemies to the
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  Speaker 1: human race in general. Thus, mainly through my instrumentality, was
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  Speaker 1: the country rid of a monstrous foul blot, such as
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  Speaker 1: no land since the flood has ever been cursed with.
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  Speaker 1: Though I deny not that Domini, Mure and Nell Kennedy
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  Speaker 1: helped well according to their possibles. Yet the most part
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  Speaker 1: of the credit was rightly given to me, who had
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  Speaker 1: twice adventured my life within the cave of death, though
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  Speaker 1: as I admit, on both occasions against my will. Once
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  Speaker 1: more the city of Edinburgh swarmed with Kennedy's come thither
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  Speaker 1: to the great trial. There had not been so great
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  Speaker 1: a concurrence of Westland folk in Edinburgh since the memorable
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  Speaker 1: day when young Gilbert of Barginy cleared the causeway of
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  Speaker 1: us of the House of Casillis, for which afterwards we
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  Speaker 1: were one and all put to the horn to our
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  Speaker 1: great and lasting honor. As hath been related. At the Westport,
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  Speaker 1: I met Patrick Rippett, he who had taunted Benaine at
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  Speaker 1: the Mabol snowballing. Whither is your eye gone? I asked him,
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  Speaker 1: for he had a black patch where his left eye
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  Speaker 1: should have been a fause Loon piked it out and
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  Speaker 1: offered it me back on the end of his rapier,
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  Speaker 1: said Patrick Rippett with the utmost unconcern. And what said
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  Speaker 1: ye to him? I asked of Patrick, because he was
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  Speaker 1: not a man to take a jest, and such a
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  Speaker 1: jest for nothing faith. I just bartered him fair. I
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  Speaker 1: offered him his heart on the point of mine, said Rippet,
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  Speaker 1: And Soul strolled away, ogling the snutted maids at the
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  Speaker 1: windows of the highlands as best he could with the
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  Speaker 1: one wicked orb which was left to him. I was
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  Speaker 1: walking with my father at the time. He had ridden
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  Speaker 1: the long way from Karryok on a white pony, all
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  Speaker 1: to pleasure my mother. Ye maun gang, and hear the
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  Speaker 1: Laddie gie his evidence, she bade him, they will fright
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  Speaker 1: him to deed else Among the Edinburgh men of the law,
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  Speaker 1: they are no canny so long as Lansky striking at
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  Speaker 1: them with the steel. I ken he is safe and sound.
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  Speaker 1: For his hand, can ye and keep his head as
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  Speaker 1: the Kennedy's ever should. But wak hens what they may
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  Speaker 1: do to my laddie when he stands afford the justicers
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  Speaker 1: and the lawyer loons come at him with their quips
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  Speaker 1: and quandaries. Faith then, good wife said my father, ye
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  Speaker 1: shall come too, and thou and I shalt ride to
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  Speaker 1: Edinburgh like joes that are newly wed. And though at
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  Speaker 1: first she denied, yet at the last she consented, well
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  Speaker 1: pleased enough, having a desire to purchase garmentry more suitable
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  Speaker 1: for the wife of a laird and the mother of
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  Speaker 1: one who was to be made a knight. When my
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  Speaker 1: mother went out for the first time, she held up
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  Speaker 1: her hands and exclaimed the noise and bustle of the
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  Speaker 1: high street, the soldiers who were forever marching to and
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  Speaker 1: fro in companies with drums and pipes, the lasses that
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  Speaker 1: went hither and thither with a shawl about their heads,
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  Speaker 1: and bandied compliments, and such compliments with swashbucklers and rantipole
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  Speaker 1: prentice lads. The limmers they need soundly scalping, said my mother,
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  Speaker 1: for ah that they can carry their heads so high
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  Speaker 1: and their kirtels higher than their heads. Surely scantly, that
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  Speaker 1: said my father, But I continued my mother, not heeding
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  Speaker 1: him in her pressive speech. Such hair brained hempies wide
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  Speaker 1: bedook it in the limours dub on Saturday in every
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  Speaker 1: decent country, and set on the black stool of repentance
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  Speaker 1: Ilka Sabbath day. I wonder what the King and the
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  Speaker 1: ministers oh Edinburgh can be thinking of. There was, however,
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  Speaker 1: for most of us a long and weary waiting here
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  Speaker 1: in the town of Edinburgh. The High Court of Justiciary
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  Speaker 1: was ripe for the hearing of the case against the Mures.
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  Speaker 1: But when at last the great day came, the whole
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  Speaker 1: West Country was there. This is a footnote. Sir Launcelot
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  Speaker 1: Kennedy of Pelgowin and Kyriok appears somewhat to have confused
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  Speaker 1: the dates of the first and second trials of John
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  Speaker 1: Muir of Achandrane. Indeed, weakness in exact chronology is common
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  Speaker 1: to his record and to the contemporary history of the Kennedys,
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  Speaker 1: which was written about the same time by a partisan
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  Speaker 1: of the other side. It may even be by John
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  Speaker 1: Muir of Achendraine himself. And though many a face was joyous,
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  Speaker 1: as were ours, Eke, many were sad and louring for
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  Speaker 1: it is strange that some ill men should have some
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  Speaker 1: to love them, or at least so it was with
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  Speaker 1: John Muir the Elder. And so there were in the
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  Speaker 1: city mers by the score fighting blackavised Maccarro's, cankered Crawford's,
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  Speaker 1: with all the disbanded bargaining discontents from the south of Carrick,
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  Speaker 1: from Murky's broken band, from the hill lands of bar
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  Speaker 1: together with many others, so that we kept our swords
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  Speaker 1: as at our first visit to the town in the
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  Speaker 1: days of Gilbert Kennedy, free in their scabbards while we
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  Speaker 1: ruffled it along the pavement. And I mind what my
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  Speaker 1: mother said the first time she went down the plainstones
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  Speaker 1: with me, we met young Anthony Kennedy of Benin, and
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  Speaker 1: I perceived that it was his intent to take the
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  Speaker 1: wall of me. So I squared myself and went a
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  Speaker 1: little before with my hand on my rapier hilt and
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  Speaker 1: my elbows wide, also cocking fiercely my bonnet over my eye,
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  Speaker 1: which assurance feared Kennedy so greatly that he meekly took
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  Speaker 1: the pavement edge. And I went by with my mother
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  Speaker 1: on my arm, having, as I thought, come off very
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  Speaker 1: well in the matter. But my mother stood stock still
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  Speaker 1: in amazement. Lotti lattie, I ken now what had taken
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  Speaker 1: ye ye prinked in passage for all the world like
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  Speaker 1: our bantam cock at Kuryok when he hears his neighbor
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  Speaker 1: at Kirimoor craw on the prime of the morn gin
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  Speaker 1: ye gang on that gait ye will get your cane
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  Speaker 1: buried and scarted, my lad, So listen your old mother
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  Speaker 1: and walk mere humbly. At this I was somewhat shamed
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  Speaker 1: and dropped behind like a little whipped messin, for my
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  Speaker 1: mother has a brisk tongue. My father said not a word,
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  Speaker 1: but there was a look of dry humorsomeness upon his face,
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  Speaker 1: which I knew and feared more than my mother's clipped
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  Speaker 1: with tongue. End of Chapter forty eight.