`` What ? '' cries the carter , in so sharp a note that his very horse started ; and then , `` Well , mannie , '' he added , `` it 's nane of my affairs ; but ye seem a decent-spoken lad ; and if ye 'll take a word from me , ye 'll keep clear of the Shaws . '' The next person I came across was a dapper little man in a beautiful white wig , whom I saw to be a barber on his rounds ; and knowing well that barbers were great gossips , I asked him plainly what sort of a man was Mr. Balfour of the Shaws . `` Hoot , hoot , hoot , '' said the barber , `` nae kind of a man , nae kind of a man at all ; '' and began to ask me very shrewdly what my business was ; but I was more than a match for him at that , and he went on to his next customer no wiser than he came . I can not well describe the blow this dealt to my illusions . The more indistinct the accusations were , the less I liked them , for they left the wider field to fancy . What kind of a great house was this , that all the parish should start and stare to be asked the way to it ? or what sort of a gentleman , that his ill-fame should be thus current on the wayside ? If an hour 's walking would have brought me back to Essendean , I had left my adventure then and there , and returned to Mr. Campbell 's . But when I had come so far a way already , mere shame would not suffer me to desist till I had put the matter to the touch of proof ; I was bound , out of mere self-respect , to carry it through ; and little as I liked the sound of what I heard , and slow as I began to travel , I still kept asking my way and still kept advancing . It was drawing on to sundown when I met a stout , dark , sour-looking woman coming trudging down a hill ; and she , when I had put my usual question , turned sharp about , accompanied me back to the summit she had just left , and pointed to a great bulk of building standing very bare upon a green in the bottom of the next valley . The country was pleasant round about , running in low hills , pleasantly watered and wooded , and the crops , to my eyes , wonderfully good ; but the house itself appeared to be a kind of ruin ; no road led up to it ; no smoke arose from any of the chimneys ; nor was there any semblance of a garden . My heart sank . `` That ! '' I cried . The woman 's face lit up with a malignant anger . `` That is the house of Shaws ! '' she cried . `` Blood built it ; blood stopped the building of it ; blood shall bring it down . See here ! ''
she XXXXX again -- `` I spit upon the ground , and crack my thumb at it !
's See added asked bring came come cried cries start