Kidnapped

house." "Ay," said I, "but the folk that are in it?" "Folk?" cried he. "Are ye daft? There's nae folk there—to call folk."
  "What?" says I; "not Mr. Ebenezer?"
  "Oh, ay," says the man, "there's the laird, to be sure, if it's him you're wanting. What'll like be your business, mannie?"
  "I was led to think that I would get a situation," I said, looking as modest as I could.
  "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 cannot 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.