Part 5

Charlie gave a little gasp. "We're at our devotions right now ourselves," he said, so low that uncle could not hear. Then we had a swift little debate. I was for prayers, and Charlie said he believed they had brought that whole Presbytery together just to convert me. Which, I retorted, would be like training all the guns of the American navy on one little house fly.

Anyhow, we went in--even Charlie couldn't have done anything else--and the Reverend Gordon Laird had the Bible in his hand.

"Do you sing?" he suddenly enquired, looking up from the book.

"Who?" asked my Aunt Agnes, quite amazed.

"Oh! I mean, do you have singing at family worship? It's a very common custom in Scotland--they usually go together."

Of course we had never heard of such a thing. In fact, family worship in any form was one of the dainties we kept for visitors--if they were able to help themselves.

So Mr. Laird spoke a few words about their Scottish Psalmody--I had never heard the term before--and he said there were no hymns to touch them, for strength and grandeur. I consider this epoch-making, in a certain sense; for the psalms of David have been the songs in the house of my pilgrimage for long years now.

Suddenly uncle asked him to sing one for us. He seemed quite willing, and we all listened eagerly; except Charlie, who thought, I fancied, that it was a waste of precious time.

I love to sit and think again of that wonderful experience. Uncle was there, and my Aunt Agnes, and my precious mother; my promised husband, too, was of the little company. I can see again the look of expectation, surprise, and almost wonder as the young minister, with serious mien, sang us one of the psalms of his native land. He chose the eighty-ninth--I know them nearly all by number now. Our visitor's voice was not so cultured as some I have heard, but it was clear and sweet, and his ear was true,--and, best of all, his whole soul seemed to be in the great words as they rose slowly from his lips. The words are so noble that I must write them out.

"Oh! greatly blessed the people are The joyful sound that know-- In brightness of Thy face, oh, Lord, They ever on shall go.

"They in Thy name shall all the day Rejoice exceedingly And in Thy righteousness shall they Exalted be on high."

So ran the mighty song. But I think we felt the grandeur of it most when he sang the next two lines:

"Because the glory of their strength Doth only stand in Thee,"

which impressed me then, and still impresses me, as the most majestic union of words I ever heard in any form of religious song.

"That's wonderful!" said my mother as the psalm was finished.

"Beautiful!" contributed my uncle; "sounds like it ought to be sung by a race of giants."

"So it was," said Mr. Laird. "The martyrs have sung those words--hundreds of them. That psalm was a favourite with the Covenanters."

"The what?" interjected Mr. Giddens. "The Covenanters, did you say? Who were they?"

"The Covenanters," replied Mr. Laird. "And I consider that's the greatest name ever given to a band of men."

"Were they a religious sect?" asked Charlie.

"No, sir--they were a religious army," answered Mr. Laird. "And I've got their blood in my veins. Some of my ancestors laid down their lives for their faith--and this world never saw an aristocracy like to them." His cheeks were flushed, his whole face animated with a wonderful light--and he looked really beautiful. Never shall I forget the expression on the faces round me; they didn't know what to make of this so unfamiliar kind of man.

But Charlie was not through with the subject yet. "Well, that kind of thing may have suited them," he began again, "and there certainly is a kind of strength about it. But I don't like it as well as our church hymns," he continued, smiling.

"I didn't think you would," replied the minister, not smiling at all.

Then Mr. Laird took the Bible and went on with worship. He first read a bit from the Scriptures, though what part it was I cannot remember. After that he prayed. A beautiful, simple prayer--I thought it was so manly, though that's a strange word to apply to a prayer. But he never did think, as I came to know well enough later on, that God cares to have us abase ourselves just for the sake of doing so. Strangely enough, the only one thing I definitely remember about his prayer is that he said: "Give us a good night's rest," and it struck me as a beautifully simple petition.

There is one feature of that evening's worship that lingers with me very vividly. After we knelt down--his chair was a few feet from mine--Charlie crept over to the sofa where I was kneeling and bowed down beside me. It thrilled me so--perhaps not in terms of Charlie Giddens exactly--but it was the first time I ever thought of love and prayer going together. And I recall how overpoweringly it came to me that there could, surely, be nothing more sweet than this, that two who loved each other should pray together, and should feel that even death could never separate them, because their love was set in the light of the Invisible. Charlie took my hand, too, and I rather think his eyes were open--I know his face was turned to mine--but I couldn't be sure of this, for my own were tightly closed.

I went outside the door with Charlie after he had said good-night to all but me; and I do not think the silent night ever appeared so glorious before. There was no moon, but the stars were shining calmly overhead, and a sweet stillness, fragrant with the breath of spring, was all about us. I could hear the twittering of birds in the magnolia tree, and wondered if they were the love-lorn pair I had seen taking shelter there.

I fancy I was still thinking of the great words and the great thoughts of the swelling psalm, but Charlie seemed to have forgotten all about it. He evidently didn't want anything but me. And his voice was full of tender passion as he began and pressed his suit again--right away, he said, it must be right away. And he rang the changes a little on the yacht and Europe--I wished so much he hadn't mentioned these, for I felt, in a kind of hungry way, that they had nothing to do with the real case. He told me how much he loved me, and how empty life would be without me at his side--but this was in between, and I felt, away down in my heart, that he wasn't putting things in their proper places. But he put his arm about me, and kissed me, three or four times, I think. And then he tried again to make me promise--but I wouldn't.

"When we go abroad, we'll go and see where that parson used to herd the sheep," he said, and laughed. "It's a wonder he didn't bring his collie with him, isn't it?" and I felt my cheeks burn with resentment at the jest. But I didn't let him see it--for I felt I had no right to resent it. Besides, he had herded sheep on the hills--he said so himself--and that was the worst of it. I thought something like that then, at least, poor fool.

"Let me see its light again," said Charlie, taking my hand and looking at my engagement ring; "it makes the whole night radiant, doesn't it?" with which he kissed it, and held it to my lips that I might do the same. I couldn't help glancing proudly at it, too, for it was a beauty--and mother said no girl of our circle had ever had one so valuable.

Then Charlie went away and I went back into the parlour. They were all there except Mr. Laird.

"Well, I took him to the attic myself," said my Aunt Agnes, "and it was right amusing to see how he went on over it. I had told Lyn to light the fire, and it really looked cozy in the dark when we went in. He said it was a room fit for a king--said he felt sorry for the elder. Oh! he was just lovely about it."

My mother's mind was engrossed with something else. "Wasn't that mortifying at the table," she began, "about his having been a shepherd, I mean--he doesn't understand our way of looking at things here, or he'd never have mentioned it. I saw Mr. Giddens fairly jump in his chair."

"I thought it was lovely," I broke in with a vehemence I could not restrain; "I don't see any disgrace in that. I think it's all the more to his credit."

"Oh! no, of course, I don't mean it's any disgrace," my mother exclaimed, "but--it's so funny. It's so different from anything we've been used to."

"You're right there," said my uncle, rising and moving towards the gas jet, for he was sleepy. "That's the truth all right--he's different enough from what we usually see. I think he's refreshing, if you ask me. But he had better go slow about expressing his views on these niggers--if he doesn't want to get into trouble. That's one thing sure."

"I wish he had told us a little more about his folks," said my Aunt Agnes, yawning, and winding up her watch. "Did you notice he didn't tell us anything about his father, except that he was a shepherd--that he _is_ a shepherd," she revised, "for he's still living. I do wonder if he's engaged," she added, placing the screen in front of the fire as she spoke.

"Of course," said I; "certainly he's engaged."

"How could you know?" queried my mother instantly.

"Well, of course, I don't--but why shouldn't he be?"

No argument could avail against this very easily, and the matter stood as before.

"Oh!" my uncle suddenly exclaimed, his hand upon the chandelier, "I forgot to give him this letter--Mr. Furvell gave it to me for him at the church; it was sent on in care of Dr. Paine. But he can get it in the morning," as he deposited it on the mantel.

I promptly crossed the room and picked it up.

"You inquisitive old maid!" said my mother in mild reproach. "Aren't you ashamed of yourself?" as I stood examining the missive.

"I wanted to see what the old country stamp is like," I answered calmly, my eyes still on the envelope. Aunt Agnes was looking over my shoulder in an instant.

"It's a man's handwriting," said she.

"Oh!" I said, "yes, I reckon it is."

"And it's got Virginia spelled with two n's," she added sorrowfully.

"You don't mean to say so!" said my mother, moving over to join us.

"The more the merrier," said my uncle; "and I'm going to put out the gas, if it had a dozen. All aboard for the upper deck."

Wherewith we all moved towards the stairs. "The last I saw of your Gordon Laird," said my aunt to me as we went up together, "he was standing with his face hidden in those roses."

"Oh!" said I, "did you tell him who it was took them to his room?"

"No, never thought of it."

"I'm so glad," said I--with a little sigh.

VIII

_"DEALINGS WITH THE SAMARITANS"_

There's something lovely about having a lovely time. Now I know that looks like a very foolish sentence when one reads it over after having written it down. So many sentences are like that; you think they're strong, beautiful, full of meaning and bright with fancy, while you're getting them out--then they appear so pale and thin when you look them over. They're like the fish that you're playing in the water: "What a whopper," you say, "I've got this time!"--but how thin and small when it lies panting on the grass.

Yet I venture to repeat, as Mr. Furvell says in his sermons, I venture to repeat: there's something lovely about having a lovely time. In this, I mean, that it can never be taken away from you. There will, you know, be cold, dark days, and bitter disappointments, and burning tears, and emptiness of heart, till you quite forget that ever you were glad. But, even so, all these can never rob you of that one hour, or day, or month of pleasure unalloyed.

Mr. Laird used to say something like this in the long happy days that followed his arrival. It had not been hard to persuade him to prolong his visit. Fortunately for us, his friend Dr. Paine was engaged to go, the very next week, to the meeting of the General Assembly at Dallas; so it was arranged Mr. Laird should tarry with us till he returned, perhaps longer--for I think it was about decided that he was to take up mission work in Canada.

When I say those days were happy, I mean in a perfectly sane and unfeverish kind of way, of course, with no thought of--of what every woman looks for in every book she reads. That is, no calm and courageous thought of it; although I shouldn't wonder if something of that, more or less diluted, lies back of all real joy. Anyhow, Mr. Laird said that very thing, and more than once, about the unloseableness of one hour or day of real happiness. Whatever has been before of pain, or whatever may be ahead of sorrow, he said, neither the one nor the other can ever make pure gladness as if it had never been. It belongs to you forever, said the Reverend Gordon Laird.

I should have known that I had no right to be so happy. For one thing, Charlie had gone back to Savannah, and I should have been miserable over that, if conscience had been half as faithful as it should have been. Then, besides, he was waiting for my decision about Europe and the yacht--and I had no claim to happiness till that was settled. And, most of all, I wasn't sure about my love for him--very far from it--and so I should have been quite wretched.

But I wasn't. I was shamefully happy. We were all happy, I think, to see our visitor so thoroughly delighted with everything about him. After all is said and done, American people take it as a compliment when old-country folks seem to like them. I don't think we ever forget, even the most democratic of us, that they have dukes and lords across the sea. And Mr. Laird did seem so perfectly happy. For one thing, the weather was delightful, and morning after morning found him and me--there was no one else to act as cicerone--walking or driving about the lovely haunts that surrounded our quiet little city. Everything was in the glory of bud and blossom; fragrance was wafted on every breeze; the wistaria and the yellow jasmine were gathered from a thousand trees. Sometimes we had picnics too, making our way on our asthmatic little launch up the winding river; sometimes we went together to the oyster market at the wharf, where he seemed to be quite enchanted with the negroes' singing. "On the other side of Jordan," I remember, was a great favourite of his, and he used to get them to sing it again and again.

Indeed, everything connected with negroes seemed to have a strange fascination for Mr. Laird. This perplexed me considerably, and mortified me not a little too. Of course, having spent all my life among them, they were a commonplace lot to me, and I regarded them with the kindly disdain which marks every Southern girl's attitude to the negro race. But Mr. Laird seemed to find a new vein in them--and, besides, he was so intensely human and so tremendously interested in all human things. But he didn't know how volcanic was the ground he walked on when he came into contact with the darkies; and I may as well go aside here to tell how this provided the only jarring note in all that memorable visit.

One day we were all on the piazza, engaged in that most delightful occupation of waiting for dinner to be announced, catching savoury whiffs the while that betokened its near approach. All of a sudden a coal-black negress came through the back gate and stood at the foot of the porch steps. Beside her stood a little curly-headed boy, about three years of age, clinging to his mother's hand. She had been asking for something at the kitchen door, I think--they were always asking for something, those darkies. Of course we simply looked at her; I don't believe uncle quite did that--I think he pretended to be reading a newspaper. But Mr. Laird, in his impulsive way, went right down the steps and began talking to the woman. It was really aggravating to see how flattered she seemed to be by his attention. And then, to our horror--clergyman as he was and in full ministerial dress--Mr. Laird actually took that pickaninny up, and flung him onto his shoulder, pretending to be a horse or something of that sort. And the little negro dug his hands into Mr. Laird's ruddy locks, while his Anglo-Saxon steed made an exhibition of himself, galloping once or twice around the flower bed. The mother grinned with delight in a way that I knew fairly maddened uncle.

When Mr. Laird finally returned, panting, to his chair, uncle had quite a time controlling himself to speak.

"Do you know who that child is, sir?" said my uncle, keeping his voice under fine control.

"No," said Mr. Laird, innocent of everything; "no, I never saw him before--do you, Mr. Lundy?"

Uncle threw his newspaper on the floor without a word. Mr. Laird, still all unconscious, meekly stooped and picked it up. "I guess I'd better go and fix my hair before dinner," he said, running his fingers through the startled thatch.

"You'd better wash your hands, sir," said my uncle sternly, oblivious to muttered appeals from both Aunt Agnes and my mother; "I'll tell you who that child is, sir--it's a coon."

"What?" said Mr. Laird, beginning to apprehend.

"It's a coon, sir," my uncle repeated, as sternly as if he had been defining some cub of the jungle; "it's a nigger coon."

"Well?" said Mr. Laird, looking uncle very steadfastly in the eye.

"Well," echoed my uncle, "yes, well." Then he paused, but soon gathered fresh strength. "And I hardly need to tell you, I presume, sir, that it's not our custom to fondle darkey babies--they're supposed to soil white hands, sir," he declared, waxing warm.

Mr. Laird looked innocently at his own. "It hasn't injured mine any, Mr. Lundy," he said simply. "I don't quite understand what caused the--the panic," he concluded, still looking very steadfastly at uncle.

"Well, then, sir, I may as well tell you plainly that such an action as yours would be considered quite--quite improper, to say the least. We don't take familiarities like that with negro children."

"It's a harmless enough looking little chap," responded Mr. Laird, nodding towards the receding youngster. He was toddling along beside his mother, his hand in hers.

"They're harmless enough while you keep them in their place, sir," retorted my uncle. "But you must know that our people down here have their own way of doing that. And you don't understand the situation, sir, you don't understand the situation," repeated Uncle Henry, employing the favourite formula of the South. "For instance, I heard you express surprise at something the other day. You remember when Smallwood, the rector of the Coloured Episcopal Church, called to ask Mrs. Lundy for a subscription--you seemed horrified that he went to the back door, because he was a preacher and dressed up like a bishop."

Mr. Laird nodded.

"Well, sir, if he was the Archbishop of Canterbury--or the Pope of Rome--the back door's the place for him--so long as that's the colour of his skin. There isn't a self-respecting white family in the city but would shut the front door in his face. You understand, sir?"

"I don't think any more of them for that," was the quiet retort of Mr. Laird.

"That may be, sir. They'll stand your contempt, sir--but they won't let a pack of negroes walk all over 'em," my uncle's gorge rising again. "And I hope to God none of our neighbours saw you on the gallop round our back yard with a negro brat astride of you. You'd be finished here, sir, if they did. Just before that wench came in here with her young 'un, I was going to tell you that I met Mr. Furvell, and he asked me to give you an invitation, for him, to preach in our church next Sunday. Well, sir, I hope it'll stand all right--but if it got round town that you made a saddle-horse out of yourself for a nigger whelp to ride, you'd have the church to yourself, sir; I reckon a few old women might go to hear you, but you wouldn't have enough men there to take up the collection."

"I can't do it, Mr. Lundy," said the minister, with amazing quietness.

"Can't do what?" demanded uncle.

"Can't preach for your friend," replied the other. "I'm engaged."

"Engaged for what?"

"Engaged to preach."

"Where?" said uncle, quite forgetful now of the debate. I think the same question came in the same breath from my mother and Aunt Agnes.

"In the Coloured Methodist Church--I think they call it Zion," Mr. Laird informed us calmly. "I was there the other day at a funeral--pretty boisterous funeral it was, too--and the preacher got hold of me. They took up a collection," Mr. Laird laughed, "and that was how they located me. I didn't have anything but a shilling--a quarter, you call it. Well, he invited me to preach for him next Sabbath, and I agreed. So I won't be able to oblige Mr. Furvell."

"You agreed, sir?"

"Yes, Mr. Lundy, I agreed," repeated the stoical Scotchman.

"Good God!" said my Uncle Henry. My uncle was not a profane man--but this was something extra.

"Don't get excited, Henry, don't," began my mother; "Mr. Laird can easily change all that--he can get released from his engagement. He didn't know we wanted him in our church."

"I'm not excited, ma'am," puffed my uncle; "I was never calmer in my life--but the thing's preposterous, madam. It's utterly absurd--it's ridiculous."

"Yes, yes," broke in my Aunt Agnes, "of course, it's the easiest thing in the world to arrange. All Mr. Laird has to do is to explain to that coloured preacher that----"

"But I can't," interrupted Mr. Laird; "that is, I won't." The word fell strangely on the ears of Southern ladies. "I gave him my promise--and that's the end of it. I'll preach in Zion Church--or whatever they call it--next Sabbath morning. If the Lord will," he added, with what appeared to us all quite superfluous piety. I didn't know then that Scotch people never take any chances.

"But you don't realize what you're doing, sir," remonstrated my uncle; "you fail to realize----"

"I'm doing what no man will prevent," broke in our visitor, and his eye was flashing like the diamond on my finger; "I'm going to preach the Gospel to them, if I get the chance."

"That's all right," began my uncle, "that's all right in its way, but----"

"What's all right in its way?" demanded the Reverend Gordon Laird, his voice quite resounding now.

"That's all right--that Gospel business," explained my uncle, evidently a little at a loss. "The Gospel's all right in its place, but----

"Thank you," gave back Mr. Laird, his strong Scotch lip trembling, "you're very magnanimous, sir."

"But you don't know what you're exposing yourself to," pursued my uncle, apparently deaf to Mr. Laird's retort. "They'll make a fool of you in the pulpit, sir. I'll tell you something, sir. Your sermon will be wasted. We had a man here once--a white man--an evangelist, who expected to move on anyhow. And he tried this little trick of yours--he preached to those coons in their own church one day. And I heard later how they made a fool of him. He preached about folks having to use the means. Good sermon, too, sir. But he was no sooner through than the nigger preacher got up after him--and he said he'd give them a little illustration. Then he told them a ribald yarn, sir, right in the church; said he and his ten-year-old brother were in bed once, and they heard their mother telling their father of some devilment they'd been up to; and the father said he'd go up-stairs when he had finished his supper. Well, this nigger preacher went on to say he got up to pray--but his brother--his brother believed in using the means; and so he said he wouldn't pray, but he'd get up and put something on. That's what he told them, sir--an indecent tale--and the white preacher had to sit and hear it," concluded my uncle, his cheeks burning with indignation.

"I won't give the black brother a chance to illustrate," said Mr. Laird stolidly; "I'll close the service when I'm through." Then he laughed.