Ned Gowan

Ned Gowan is a diminutive, precise Edinburgh lawyer in the service of Clan MacKenzie, dispatched to collect rents and settle disputes with a quill and a startling amount of nerve. He dresses immaculately, speaks in careful legal cadences, and turns out to be far handier in a crisis than his age and profession suggest.

Bill Paterson plays him as pure delight: a fussy man of paperwork who reveals, in flashes, the steel underneath. The writing keeps surprising you with what he's capable of, and Paterson never oversells it — he stays dry, courtly, and entirely unbothered, which is exactly why the reveals land so well.