"Pit your bogie pate oot o' your weendow, me gillie!" he cried. "I'll gie it a garry crack. Pit it oot, I say! Pit it oot!" And the old man drew himself back into an attitude which would have defied the powers of Phidias to reproduce in marble, the stone poised accurately and all too ready to be hurled. "Ye ramshackle macloonatic!" he cried. "Standin' in a weendow, where nane may see, an' heepin' eensoolts on deecint fowk. Pit it oot--pit it oot--an' get it crackit!" The reply was instant: "Gang awa', gang awa'--ha, ha, ha!" Had Lang Tammas been a creation of Lever, he would at this point have removed his coat and his hat and thrown them down violently to earth, and then have whacked the walk three times with the stout stick he carried in his right hand, as a preliminary to the challenge which followed. But Tammas was not Irish, and therefore not impulsive. He was Scotch--as Scotch as ever was. Wherefore he removed his hat, and, after dusting it carefully, hung it up on a convenient hook; took off his coat and folded it neatly; picked up his "faithfu' steck," and observed: "I hae naething to do that's of eemportance. Drumsheugh can wait, an' sae can ee. Pit it oot, pit it oot! Here I am, an' here I stay until ye pit it oot to be crackit." "Gang awa', gang awa'--ha, ha, ha!" came the reply. Lang Tammas turned on the instant to the sources of the sound. He fixed his eyes sternly on the very window whence he thought the words had issued. "Number twanty-three, saxth floor," he muttered to himself. "I will call, and then we shall see what we _shall_ see; and if what we see gets off wi'oot a thorough 'hootin',' then I dinna ken me beezniss." [Illustration: "A SWEET-FACED NURSE APPEARED"] Hastily discarding his outward wrath, and assuming such portions of his garments as went with his society manner, Tammas walked into the lobby of the apartment-house in which his assumed insulter lived. He pushed the electric button in, and shortly a sweet-faced nurse appeared. "Who are you?" she asked. "Me," said Lang Tammas, somewhat abashed. "I've called too see the head o' the hoose." "I am sorry," said the trained nurse, bursting into tears, "but the head of the house is at the point of death, sir, and cannot see you until to-morrow. Call around about ten o'clock." "Hoots an' toots!" sighed Lang Tammas. "Canna we Scuts have e'er a story wi'oot somebody leein' at the point o' death! It's most affectin', but doonricht wearin' on the constitootion." "Was there anything you wished to say to him?" asked the nurse. "Oh, aye!" returned Lang Tammas. "I dinna ken hoo to deny that I hed that to say to him, an' to do to him as weel. I'm a vairy truthfu' mon, young lady, an' if ye must be told, I've called to wring his garry neck for dereesively gee'in an unoffending veesitor frae Thrums by yelling deealect at him frae the hoose-tops." "Are you sure it was here?" asked the nurse, anxiously, the old gentleman seemed so deeply in earnest.