It was more than eight years after Auld Jock fled from the threat of a doctor that Mr.Traill's prediction, that his tongue would get him into trouble with the magistrates, was fulfilled; and then it was because of the least-considered slip in speaking to a boyhood friend who happened to be a Burgh policeman.
Many things had tried the landlord of Ye Olde Greyfriars Dining-Rooms.After a series of soft April days, in which lilacs budded and birds sang in the kirkyard, squalls of wind and rain came up out of the sea-roaring east.The smoky old town of Edinburgh was so shaken and beaten upon and icily drenched that rattling finials and tiles were torn from ancient gables and whirled abroad.Rheumatic pains were driven into the joints of the elderly.Mr.Brown took to his bed in the lodge, and Mr.
Traill was touchy in his temper.
A sensitive little dog learns to read the human barometer with a degree of accuracy rarely attained by fellowmen and, in times of low pressure, wisely effaces himself.His rough thatch streaming, Bobby trotted in blithely for his dinner, ate it under the settle, shook himself dry, and dozed half the afternoon.
To the casual observer the wee terrier was no older than when his master died.As swift of foot and as sound of wind as he had ever been, he could tear across country at the heels of a new generation of Heriot laddies and be as fresh as a daisy at nightfall.Silvery gray all over, the whitening hairs on his face and tufted feet were not visible.His hazel-brown eyes were still as bright and soft and deep as the sunniest pools of Leith Water.
It was only when he opened his mouth for a tiny, pink cavern of a yawn that the points of his teeth could be seen to be wearing down; and his after-dinner nap was more prolonged than of old.At such times Mr.Traill recalled that the longest life of a dog is no more than a fifth of the length of days allotted to man.
On that snarling April day, when only himself and the flossy ball of sleeping Skye were in the place, this thought added to Mr.
Traill's discontent.There had been few guests.Those who had come in, soaked and surly, ate their dinner in silence and discomfort and took themselves away, leaving the freshly scrubbed floor as mucky as a moss-hag on the moor.Late in the afternoon a sergeant, risen from the ranks and cocky about it, came in and turned himself out of a dripping greatcoat, dapper and dry in his red tunic, pipe-clayed belt, and winking buttons.He ordered tea and toast and Dundee marmalade with an air of gay well-being that was no less than a personal affront to a man in Mr.Traill's frame of mind.Trouble brewed with the tea that Ailie Lindsey, a tall lassie of fifteen, but shy and elfish as of old, brought in on a tray from the scullery.
When this spick-and-span non-commissioned officer demanded Mr.
Traill's price for the little dog that took his eye, the landlord replied curtly that Bobby was not for sale.The soldier was insolently amused.
"That's vera surprisin'.I aye thoucht an Edinburgh shopkeeper wad sell ilka thing he had, an' tak' the siller to bed wi' 'im to keep 'im snug the nicht."Mr.Traill returned, with brief sarcasm, that "his lairdship" had been misinformed.
"Why wull ye no' sell the bit dog?" the man insisted.
The badgered landlord turned upon him and answered at length, after the elaborate manner of a minister who lays his sermon off in sections"First: he's no' my dog to sell.Second: he's a dog of rare discreemination, and is no' like to tak' you for a master.Third:
you soldiers aye have with you a special brand of shulling-a-day impudence.And, fourth and last, my brither: I'm no' needing your siller, and I can manage to do fair weel without your conversation."As this bombardment proceeded, the sergeant's jaw dropped.When it was finished he laughed heartily and slapped his knee."Man, come an' brak bread wi' me or I'll hae to brak yer stiff neck."A truce was declared over a cozy pot of tea, and the two became at least temporary friends.It was such a day that the landlord would have gossiped with a gaol bird; and when a soldier who has seen years of service, much of it in strange lands, once admits a shopkeeper to equality, he can be affable and entertaining "by the ordinar'." Mr.Traill sketched Bobby's story broadly, and to a sympathetic listener; and the soldier told the landlord of the animals that had lived and died in the Castle.
Parrots and monkeys and strange dogs and cats had been brought there by regiments returning from foreign countries and colonies.
But most of the pets had been native dogs-collies, spaniels and terriers, and animals of mixed breeds and of no breed at all, but just good dogs.No one knew when the custom began, but there was an old and well-filled cemetery for the Castle pets.When a dog died a little stone was set up, with the name of the animal and the regiment to which it had belonged on it.Soldiers often went there among the tiny mounds and told stories of the virtues and taking ways of old favorites.And visitors read the names of Flora and Guy and Dandie, of Prince Charlie and Rob Roy, of Jeanie and Bruce and Wattie.It was a merry life for a dog in the Castle.He was petted and spoiled by homesick men, and when he died there were a thousand mourners at his funeral.
"Put it to the bit Skye noo.If he tak's the Queen's shullin' he belongs to the army." The sergeant flipped a coin before Bobby, who was wagging his tail and sniffing at the military boots with his ever lively interest in soldiers.
He looked up at the tossed coin indifferently, and when it fell to the floor he let it lie."Siller " has no meaning to a dog.
