If she guessed the reason of his absence from her side she made no remark, receiving him as if she had just parted from him, with that omission of greeting which implies so much. She had sent for him, she said, because her man of business had given her a legal paper that she would not sign without his advice. She looked him in the face as fearlessly as ever, and her glance sparkled with its wonted fire. For some tormented minutes he could not decide whether or no to charge her with knowledge of the fraud that had been carried on under his roof, but he had not the courage to do so. Also, he was acute enough to see that she might well reply to his reproaches by reminding him that he had only himself to thank for their acquaintance. She had not made the advances; his own zeal had brought about their situation. He felt like a fool, but he saw that in speaking he might look like one, which some consider worse.
He left her, assuring himself that all was fair in love and politics; that he could not, in common good breeding, withhold his help from her in her legal difficulty; that, should wind of Archie's dealings with him get abroad in the town, he would be saving appearances in avoiding a rupture with the lady whose shadow he had been since he arrived in Edinburgh, and that it was his duty as a well-wisher of Prince Charles to keep open any channel that might yield information about Flemington's movements. Whatsoever may have been the quality of his reasons, their quantity was remarkable. He did not like the little voice that whispered to him that he would not have dared to offer them to James.
There was no further risk of a meeting with Archie, for within a few days of the latter's appearance in Hyndford's Close he had been sent to the Border with instructions to watch Jedburgh and the neighbourhood of Liddesdale, through which the Prince's army had passed on its march to England. Madam Flemington knew that the coast was clear, and David had no suspicion that it had been otherwise. Very few people in Edinburgh were aware of Flemington's visit to it; it was an event of which even the caddies were ignorant.
And so Balnillo lingered on, putting off his return to Angus from week to week. His mouse-coloured velvet began to show signs of wear and was replaced by a suit of dark purple; his funds were dwindling a little, for he was not a rich man, and a new set of verses about him was going the round of the town. Then, with January, came the battle of Falkirk and the siege of Stirling Castle, and the end of the month brought Cumberland and the mustering of loyal Whigs to wait upon him at Holyrood Palace.