THE THIRTY-NINE STEPS
afore that herdin' on Leithen Water. My freends ca' me Ecky, and whiles Specky, for I wear glasses, bein' weak i' the sicht. Just you speak the surveyor fair and ca' him sir, and he'll be fell pleased. I'll be back or midday."
I borrowed his spectacles and filthy old hat; stripped off coat, waistcoat and collar and gave him them to carry home; borrowed, too, the foul stump of a clay pipe as an extra property. He indicated my simple tasks, and without more ado set off at an amble bedwards. Bed may have been his chief object, but I think there was also something left in the foot of a bottle. I prayed that he might be safe under cover before my friends arrived on the scene.
Then I set to work to dress for the part. I opened the collar of my shirt—it was a vulgar blue-and-white check such as plowmen wear—and revealed a neck as brown as any tinker's. I rolled up my sleeves and there was a forearm which might have been a blacksmith's, sunburnt and rough with old scars. I got my boots and trouser-legs all white from
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