It was a touchy servant this, Montaiglon told himself--somewhat sharper, too, than he had thought: he must hazard no unkind ironies upon the master. “Charming, charming! good Mungo,” said he. “The expedient might have been devised by my own great-grandfather--a gentleman of--of--of commercial pursuits in Lyons city. I am less fastidious, perhaps, than the Irish, being very glad to take Doom Castle as I have the honour to find it.” “But ye're thinkin' the Baron is in a hurry to billet ye elsewhere,” said the servant bluntly. In an ordinary lackey this boldness would have been too much for Count Victor; in this grotesque, so much in love, it seemed, with his employer, and so much his familiar and friend in a ridiculous Scots fashion, the impertinence appeared pardonable. Besides, he blamed himself for the ill-breeding of his own irony. “That, if I may be permitted to point it out, is not for us to consider, Monsieur Mungo,” said he. “I have placed myself unreservedly in the Baron's hands, and if he considers it good for my indifferent health that I should change the air and take up my residence a little farther along your delightful coast while my business as a wine merchant from Bordeaux is marching, I have no doubt he has reason.” A smile he made no effort to conceal stole over Mungo's visage. “Wine merchant frae Bordeaux!” he cried. “I've seen a hantle o' them hereaboots at the fish-curin' season, but they cam' in gabbarts to French Foreland, and it wasnae usual for them to hae Coont to their names nor whingers to their hips. It was mair ordinar the ink-horn at their belts and the sporran at their groins.” “A malediction on the creature's shrewdness!” said Count Victor inwardly, while outwardly he simply smiled back. “The red wine is my specialty,” said he, patting his side where the hilt of his sword should be. “My whinger, as you call it, is an auger: who the devil ever broached a pipe of Scots spirits with a penknife? But I see you are too much in the confidence of the Baron for there to be any necessity of concealment between us.” “H'm!” exclaimed Mungo dryly, as one who has a sense of being flattered too obviously. “The Baron's a bairn, like a' true gentlemen I've seen, and he kens me lang enough and likes me weel enough to mak' nae secret o' what it were to a'body's advantage should be nae secret to Mungo Byde. In this place I'm sentinel, spy, and garrison; it wad ill become the officer in command to let me be doin' my wark withoot some clew to the maist important pairt o't. Ye're here on a search for ane Drimdarroch.” “You are a wizard, Monsieur Mungo!” cried Montaiglon, not without chagrin at Doom's handing over so vast and vital a secret to a menial.