Chapter 4 - Page 2

strange woman. Family
worship at the manse was over and Gavin was talking to his mother,
who never crossed the threshold save to go to church (though her
activity at home was among the marvels Jean sometimes slipped down
to the Tenements to announce). when Wearyworld the policeman came
to the door "with Rob Dow's compliments, and if you're no wi' me
by ten o'clock I'm to break out again." Gavin knew what this
meant, and at once set off for Rob's.

"You'll let me gang a bit wi' you," the policeman entreated, "for
till Rob sent me on this errand not a soul has spoken to me the
day; ay, mony a ane hae I spoken to, but not a man, woman, nor
bairn would fling me a word."

"I often meant to ask you," Gavin said as they went along the
Tenements, which smelled at that hour of roasted potatoes, "why
you are so unpopular."

"It's because I'm police. I'm the first ane that has ever been in
Thrums, and the very folk that appointed me at a crown a week
looks upon me as a disgraced man for accepting. It's Gospel that
my ain wife is short wi' me when I've on my uniform, though weel
she kens that I would rather hae stuck to the loom if I hadna
ha'en sic a queer richt leg. Nobody feels the shame o' my position
as I do mysel', but this is a town without pity."

"It should be a consolation to you that you are discharging useful
duties."

"But I'm no. I'm doing harm. There's Charles Dickson says that the
very sicht o' my uniform rouses his dander so muckle that it makes
him break windows, though a peaceably-disposed man till I was
appointed. And what's the use o' their haeing a policeman when
they winna come to the lock-up after I lay hands on them?"

"Do they say they won't come?"

"Say? Catch them saying onything! They just gie me a wap into the
gutters. If they would speak I wouldna complain, for I'm nat'rally
the sociablest man in Thrums."

"Rob, however, had spoken to you."

"Because he had need o' me. That was ay Rob's way, converted or no
converted. When he was blind drunk he would order me to see him
safe hame, but would he crack wi' me? Na, na."

Wearyworld, who was so called because of his forlorn way of
muttering, "It's a weary warld, and nobody bides in't," as he went
his melancholy rounds, sighed like one about to cry, and Gavin
changed the subject.

"Is the watch for the soldiers still kept up?" he asked.

"It is, but the watchers winna let me in aside them. I'll let you
see that for yoursel' at me head o' the Roods, for they watch
there in the auld windmill."

Most of the Thrums lights were