At times, too, he would take the Bible in front of him, run
it through, seem to read a bit, run it through again, and stop and
yawn prodigiously: the whole as if for exercise.
In the course of this restlessness his eye alighted on myself. He
sat a second stupefied, then tore a half-leaf out of the Bible,
scrawled upon it with a pencil, and passed it with a whispered word
to his next neighbour. The note came to Prestongrange, who gave me
but the one look; thence it voyaged to the hands of Mr. Erskine;
thence again to Argyle, where he sat between the other two lords of
session, and his Grace turned and fixed me with an arrogant eye.
The last of those interested in my presence was Charlie Stewart,
and he too began to pencil and hand about dispatches, none of which
I was able to trace to their destination in the crowd.
But the passage of these notes had aroused notice; all who were in
the secret (or supposed themselves to be so) were whispering
information--the rest questions; and the minister himself seemed
quite discountenanced by the flutter in the church and sudden stir
and whispering.
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