St. Cuthbert's Part 19

I smiled with pleasure, for the process was an interesting one. Bouquets look strange in these rough Scottish hands--but their fragrance is the sweeter for all that.

"I understand, Archie. You do not often pay a compliment, but I know its sincerity when it comes and I appreciate it all the same."

He had not finished, for he felt he had gone too far.

"Aye, that's what I was sayin' to the wife. I likit yirsel' fully better nor him--it's different ye see; I'm gettin' kind o' used to ye, ye ken!"

This made his tribute morally complete. Oh, thou Scotchman! Thou canst not withhold a tincture of lemon from the sweetest cup!

"But how is my precentor to-day?" I renewed, fearful of additional repairs to his eulogy.

"Weel, I'm no' complainin'--an' I'm no' boastin'; but there's mony a yin waur. I'm no' sufferin' pain to speak o'. I can sleep at nicht, an' I tak my parritch, an' I hae ma faculties--an' I'm in G.o.d's hauns," he said, the climax coming with unconscious power.

"There's no better bulletin than that," I responded. "I see you still take your smoke, Archie," I added cheerfully, nodding towards an ancient trusty pipe which enjoyed its brief respite on a chair, long his familiar friend, and noticeably breathing out its loyalty where it lay.

"Ou, aye, I dinna lack for ony o' the needcessities o' life, thank G.o.d,"

he replied gratefully, and with utter seriousness.

"What a blessing that you are free from pain," I hurriedly remarked; for the mouth, like a capricious steed, is more easily controlled when it is in motion.

"Aye, that's a great blessin'. I've been uncommon free frae pain. A fortnight syne, I had a verra worritsome feelin' in ma innerts--a kind o' colic, I'm jalousin'. Sandy Grant said as how whusky wi' a little sulphur was gey guid. I tell 't him I never had nowt to dae wi' sulphur i' ma life, an' I wudna begin to bother wi't noo;" and Archie lifted his eyebrows, adjusted his night-cap, and turned upon me a very solemn smile.

He doubtless saw by my face that I approved his caution, for I secretly believed that he was right. Thus confirmed, he lay meditating for a time, but it was soon made evident that his thoughts had not wandered far from the matter in hand.

"Aye, sulphur's nae improvement to whusky," he slowly averred at length, "forbye, I was richt. I was richt frae a medeecinal standpoint, ye ken.

The verra next day ma doctor ordered me to tak a little whusky for the pain I tell't ye o'. An' I did; I took it afore he tell't me."

"And it did you good, Archie?" I asked indulgently.

"Guid?" replied Archie, in a tone of much reproach. Then he said no more, scorning to demonstrate an axiom. But he was not through with the subject. The moral had still to be pointed.

"Is't no won'erfu', minister, the law o' compensation that oor Creator gies us, to reach a' through oor lives?

"Pain has its ither side, ye ken. An' when we say as hoo it's an ill wind that blaws naebody guid, we're acknowledgin' the love o' the Almichty. Ilka cloud has aye its siller linin'. Noo, for instance, it was a fearfu' pain I took--but the ither that I took to cure it--it was Scotch," and Archie drew a gentle sigh, half of piety and half of reminiscence.

When next I turned my steps towards Archie's door, though only two short days had fled, all life had changed to me and darkness hung about me like a pall. Upon which change I was bitterly reflecting when I was interrupted by a message that Archie was taken somewhat worse and not expected to live longer than through the night. And I could not but be glad of this summons from my own life's tragedy, that I might share another's. It is G.o.d's blessed way. The balm for secret sorrow is in the bosom of another burden, unselfishly a.s.sumed; and the Cyrenian of every age hath this for his hire, that, while he bends beneath another's cross, he is disburdened of his own.

I found my old precentor weak, and failing fast, but "verra composed,"

as we say in New Jedboro.

He welcomed me with a gentle smile.

"Ye'll pray wi' me," he said gravely, "but it'll no' be the closin'

prayer. I'm wearin' awa fast, but I'll no' leave ye till the morn, I'm dootin'. Pit up a bit prayer noo--but there's ae thing--dinna mind the Maister o' His promise to come again an' receive me till Himsel'--no'

that it isna a gowden word; but I want it keepit till the last an' it's the last word I want to hear. Speak it to me when I hear the surge.

That'll gie Him time eneuch, for He'll no' be far awa. An' I want to hear it aboon the billows. Noo pit up yir prayer."

Short and simple were our pet.i.tions; for the prayer of little children is best for those who are about to enter into the kingdom of G.o.d.

After we had finished, my eyes, unknown to him, were long fixed on Archie's face. For a strange interest centres about those whose loins are girded for long journeys; and I have never outgrown the boyish awe with which I witnessed the loosening of the ropes that held aerial travellers to the earth. I have seen some scores of persons die,

"By many a death-bed I have been And many a sinner's parting seen,"

but the awful tragedy is ever new and familiarity breeds increasing reverence. Death is a hero to his valet.

"You are not afraid, Archie?" I said at length--the old question that springs, not to the dying, but to the living lips.

"Afeart!" said Archie, "what wad I be afeart for?"

"You are not afraid to meet your Lord?" I answered, inwardly reproaching myself for the words.

"Afeart!" repeated the dying man, "afeart to meet ma Lord. Why should I be feart to meet a Man that died for me?"

I inwardly blessed him for the great reply and engaged its unanswerable argument for my next Sabbath's sermon. No man dieth unto himself.

"Wull ye dae something for me?" said Archie, suddenly. "Wull ye write to a man I kent lang syne?"

"Certainly," said I. "Who is the man, Archie?"

"I'll tell ye, gin ma hairt hauds guid a meenit. It's Andra Mathieson--an' he lives in San Francisco. Him an' me gaed to the schule thegither in the Auld Country, an' I hadna seen him for nigh fifty year till last Can'lemas a twalmonth, when I gaed to San Francisco for ma health. He's awfu' rich. He lives in a graun hoose an' he has a coachman wi' yin o' thae coats wi' b.u.t.tons. But I gaed to see him an' I needna hae been sae feart, for he minded on me, an' he wadna hear o' me bidin'

at the taivern, an' he took me to his graun hoose, an' he was ower guid to a plain cratur like me.

"Weel, ae mornin', we was sittin', haein' oor crack aboot the auld days, an' the schule, an' the sheep we herded thegither on the Ettrick hills.

But oor crack aye harkit back to the kirk an' the minister an' the catechism, an' a' thae deeper things o' auld lang syne. He said as hoo he had gane far bye thae things, livin' amang the stour o' a' his siller--but he remarkit that he aften thocht o' the auld ways, an' the auld tunes, an' the minister wi' his goon an' bands; an' he said he was fair starvin' for a psalm--or a paraphrase. They dinna sing them in Ameriky. An' I lilted yin till him--we was lookin' far oot at the Gowden Gate, an' it lookit like the crystal water ma een'll sune see."

Archie stopped, though apparently but little exhausted. His eyes seemed flooded with tender memories of that momentous hour on the far distant Pacific Coast.

"What psalm did you sing him?" I ventured, presently.

"It was a paraphrase," he answered, the smile still upon his face. "It was the twenty-sixth:

"'Ho ye that thirst approach the spring Where living waters flow,'

an' Andra grat like a bairn:

"'I haena heard it sin I ran barefit aboot the hills,' he said, an' he wad hae me sing the lines ower again:

"'How long to streams of false delight Will ye in crowds repair?'

an' I'm no' worthy, I ken, but I pit up a bit prayer wi' him--ye mauna think I'm boastin', sir, but I brocht him to Christ, an' when I think on't noo, it's lichtsome, an' I'm minded o' that simmer sun on the Gowden Gate. Ye'll write to him an' tell him we'll sing a psalm thegither yet."

My promise given and Andrew Mathieson's address taken, Archie lay silent for a little time. Swift glances at myself, swiftly withdrawn, denoted his desire to say something more. It came at length and with unmistakable directness.

"I'm dootin' I've been wrang; mebbe I was 'righteous over-much.'"

"What is it, Archie?" I said soothingly. "Some sin? Or some mistake in the days that are gone?"