Nicholson, Randolph
Crescent, Edinburgh. - Kirkham has disappeared; police
looking for him. All understood. Keep mind quite easy. -
Austin.' Having had this explained to him, the old gentleman
took down the cellar key and departed for two bottles of the
1820 port. Uncle Greig dined there that day, and Cousin
Robina, and, by an odd chance, Mr. Macewen; and the presence
of these strangers relieved what might have been otherwise a
somewhat strained relation. Ere they departed, the family
was welded once more into a fair semblance of unity.
In the end of April John led Flora - or, as more descriptive,
Flora led John - to the altar, if altar that may be called
which was indeed the drawing-room mantel-piece in Mr.
Nicholson's house, with the Reverend Dr. Durie posted on the
hearthrug in the guise of Hymen's priest.
The last I saw of them, on a recent visit to the north, was
at a dinner-party in the house of my old friend Gellatly
Macbride; and after we had, in classic phrase, 'rejoined the
ladies,' I had an opportunity to overhear Flora conversing
with another married woman on the much canvassed matter of a
husband's tobacco.
'Oh yes!' said she; 'I only allow Mr. Nicholson four cigars a
day. Three he smokes at fixed times - after a meal, you
know, my dear; and the fourth he can take when he likes with
any friend.'
'Bravo!' thought I to myself; 'this is the wife for my friend
John!'
THE BODY-SNATCHER
EVERY night in the year, four of us sat in the small parlour
of the George at Debenham - the undertaker, and the landlord,
and Fettes, and myself.
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