Sentence The Threehundredandfortyseventh

Patience got to keep the rag dolly: she was the only one who had known it was there and after a search on the computer showed that it was not on the inventory of the artefacts belonging to Abbotsford House, and the fact that she was in the company (custody?) of a Police Scotland officer, the authoritative WPC Isa Urquhart, the Curator, albeit reluctantly, agreed, but only after a receipt for it had been filled in and signed by Patience Scott, Isa and Daphne Dumbiedykes; the party of explorers left the House and returned to Melrose to find that the St Patrick's Day Parade was just

starting from The Greenyards for the walk up the High Street to the Market Cross and after a speech by the Chairman of Melrose Community Council, down to Melrose Abbey; the Town Band led the way and the party joined in and sang along with all the Irish Airs and Rebel Songs which filled the

town and drew huge numbers of tourists and townsfolk; this was Patience's first proper visit to the town she had known so well from her childhood and she marvelled at the mixture of the familiar and the strange: “there used to be a Starets lived in there, my Papa consulted him about aspects of the Jewish faith when he was writing Ivanhoe, about Rebecca and her father, and the Sabbath and Passover and selah, he was a lovely little old man, Rabbi Burns, you know, I used to love that name, Rebecca, have you read it?” and, of course Maude and Daphne had read Ivanhoe, indeed all of The Waverley Novels by Patience's father and they did their best to tell her what had become of some of the friends and relations she asked about, but were conscious always of how she must feel when told of the early deaths of some or the lonely later lives of others, for despite knowing that this was two hundred years since she had last been here, it was difficult for the twelve-year-old to process much of what she was told, so they said little about her own family and she did not press them, but during the day her natural propensity towards fun and jollity had been returning and she was already displaying an 

innate joie de vivre which heartened the two Professors Emeritus; after more speeches and singing in the grounds of the Abbey, the small party, including Thomas and Patience, strolled around the gardens and Thomas told them of his last visit here: “it was my last morning and I had met with the

Father Abbot, Pandelion Gillyfeather and old Brother Bede, the Almoner - oh, he was a grand wee man, he'd not always been a monk and he oft-times told me tales of his life on the high seas when he had been a mariner and,” his voice lowered to a respectful whisper, “of some of his adventures with the fair sex, for he had been a strong and lusty fellow in his earlier days; but I don't think Father Gillyfeather was so adventurous and warm-hearted: he was always something of a cold fish,” and Maude asked, “so why did you meet with him, Thomas?” and Thomas paused, in uffish thought. “he had told me that a charter had been found, supposedly signed by my father, transferring the lands of Ercildoune to the Abbey after his death: I remonstrated with him, for such could not be the truth, my dear father would never have done such a thing, but Gillyfeather insisted that it was true and had been found among my father belongings which had been laid aside after his funeral, and only just discovered - it had, he said, been witnessed by Sir Parlane MacFarlane on behalf of The King, and I confess that I struck him then, and stormed out: it was only when I reached Huntly Burn and stopped to rest and clear my head that I realised I had been followed thence by some ruffians, but before I could draw my sword I was struck by a great blow upon my head and must have been left there for dead – only to wake some time later, though I do not know if that was hours or days, or even months, but I found myself in The Cavern and being tended by the Cavern People who live there!”