MacLear; that's a fine way to think of the Sabbath!" rejoined
the minister, "and the very way I am in the habit of thinking of it
myself!--I'm greatly obliged to you for bringing home my boots; but
indeed I could have managed very well without them!"
"Ay, sir, maybe; I dinna doobt ye hae pairs and pairs o' beets; but ye see
_I_ couldna dee _wi'oot_ them, for I had _promised_."
The word struck the minister to the heart. "He means something!" he said to
himself. "--But I never promised the girl anything! I _could_ not have done
it! I never thought of such a thing! I never said anything to bind me!"
He never saw that, whether he had promised or not, his deed had bound him
more absolutely than any words.
All this time he was letting the soutar stand on the doorstep, with the new
boots in his hand.
"Come in," he said at last, "and put them there in the window. It's about
time we were all going to bed, I think--especially myself, to-morrow being
sermon-day!"
The soutar betook himself to his home and to bed, sorry that he had said
nothing, yet having said more than he knew.
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