Part 6

John Wigton was the superstitious child of a superstitious age; and he had long been in that peculiar temper of mind from which the thought of the supernatural is never far removed. With nerves and brain stimulated to a pitch of intense excitement, it was most natural that he should take for a miracle what was in reality only an instance of wonderful quickness of perception and presence of mind. Clearly God was on this man’s side, and had interposed his own arm to protect and deliver him! Then had _he_ been fighting even against God!

Overwhelmed by the thought, and conscience-stricken, he threw himself at the feet of the man whose life he sought, confessing in broken accents what he had been about to do, and why. He even named the Lord Cardinal as the instigator of the crime. Beaton had indeed been guilty, not only of a crime but of a blunder, when he selected for so tough a piece of work an instrument at once too weak and too fine.

But in betraying his employer, the miserable man had also betrayed himself, and that to an instant and horrible death. He knew and felt this as he stood there like one turned to stone, with cheeks and lips of ashy whiteness, and eyes wild with terror. The revelation of his purpose, made by himself alone, and overheard by the bystanders, had transformed the quiet orderly assembly into a frantic mob, thirsting for his blood like one man, or rather like some fierce beast of prey springing with eyes of fire upon its terrified, palsied victim. All mobs have not had so fair an excuse for violence. Should a company of men who are treading in the dark some perilous path that skirts a precipice, arrest a stranger in the act of hurling their solitary light-bearer down the rock, they would not probably be very scrupulous in their treatment of the criminal. Every man in the crowd who had a sword or whinger, drew it, and rushed towards the assassin, while the rest brandished staves or caught up stones from the street. And “the noyse rising, and coming to the ears of the sick (without the gate), they cried, ‘Deliver the traitor unto us, or ellis we will tack him by force;’ and so they birst in at the gate.”[11]

Wigton tried hard to cry to God for the mercy he dared not hope from man; but no word would come to him, nor any thought except a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation. His head dropped on his breast; his arms were folded in despair. A lifetime’s agony seemed compressed into those horrible moments. He must die, and unforgiven. All was lost—lost—lost—for ever.

No; he is saved! In the tumult he had not heard the voice of one who pleaded for his life, nor perhaps could others hear it. But George Wishart did not trust to words alone when the life of an enemy was at stake. A moment more, and Wigton felt himself clasped in the minister’s arms, shielded thus with his own person from sword and stave and whinger. “Whosoever troubles him shall trouble me,” cried the noble-hearted reformer. “He has hurt me in nothing, but has done great comfort both to you and me, for he has letten us understand what we may fear. In times to come we will watch better.”

This was George Wishart’s only vengeance. Rarely, perhaps, have such an assemblage of qualities been displayed in so brief a moment of time. But the flash of lightning which, in the space of a second, illumines a whole landscape, creates nothing of what it reveals; all was there before. Thus the occasion proved the man; what he did was but the evidence of what he was. Through patient years of “the unremitting retention of simple and high sentiments in obscure duties,” had been trained the brave and loving heart, as well as the “maist scharp eye and judgment,” which saved, that day, two lives—his own and his intended murderer’s.

Our friends without the gate had their full share in the general excitement and confusion. Archie strove and pushed and shouted with the best; no man in the crowd more eager to be avenged upon the cowardly assassin.

“I’d hae dinged his skull in wi’ a muckle stane,” he boasted afterwards, “but I daurna for guid Maister Wishart.”

Jamie told him in reply that he’d “better hae been caring the lasses,” which was true enough. For some minutes Janet and Mary, pressed as they were against the gate by those immediately behind them, were in actual peril. When at last it gave way, they were borne through it by the crowd, and swept onwards without any power of resistance. Still they clung together, sorely terrified, but unhurt, until in one unhappy moment Mary chanced to look up, and caught a glimpse of the two men on the staircase, locked together in that strange embrace.

Well did she recognise the white agonized face of her brother. At once the whole terrible truth flashed upon her mind. Her head sank on Janet’s shoulder; and had there been room to fall, she would have fallen senseless to the ground. Janet fortunately possessed a degree of muscular strength unusual in a girl; and she exerted herself to the utmost to drag her friend out of the throng. When the bystanders understood what was the matter, they made way for them as well as they could; and one or two men good-naturedly volunteered their assistance. That a girl in the crowd should faint, in circumstances of such excitement, seemed to all the most natural thing in the world. At last she was carried to a quiet spot some distance down a neighbouring wynd. Here, just as Archie and some others joined the group, she recovered consciousness, and looking round her, asked with a bewildered air, “Hae they killed him?”

Of course every one misunderstood the question. Janet answered eagerly,—

“Na, na! He’s as safe as you or I. God gied his angels charge over him!” she added, for once in her life kindling into enthusiasm, and even quoting Scripture.

“Eh, and what wad the saints hae got to do, gin they couldna tak’ care o’ _him_ amang them a’!” cried Archie, his creed rather in confusion, but his heart glowing with the delicious passion of a boy’s first hero-worship.

Mary’s pale face scarcely showed relief or pleasure. She was bowed down beneath a weight of sorrow those around her could not comprehend. Too sick at heart to repeat her question, a little reflection sufficed to convince her it was scarcely a necessary one. She did not fear for her brother’s _life_; she had such absolute trust in him under whose protection she had seen him, that to doubt either his good-will or his ability never occurred to her.

At length she turned to Janet and whispered, “Let me gang hame.”

Janet and Archie took her home, still feeling as one who dreamed. She hardly spoke to them; and she thought she dared not face Jamie then, or indeed ever again upon earth. Still she ought to tell them—she _must_ tell them—all; but oh, not yet!

She went at once to the little room where she slept, shut the door, and threw herself on her knees. Only before her God could she pour forth the anguish of her soul. Her own—her only brother—had raised his hand against the life of the man to whom she owed far more than life. For a while she must be left to the shame and the bitterness of that thought. By and by she will see comfort, rich comfort, in the mercy of Him who interposed to shield his servant from the malice of wicked men, to save her misguided brother from a fearful crime, and to give him still time for repentance.

But while Mary mourned, the men of Dundee rejoiced and gave thanks, each one as if for his own personal deliverance from terrible danger. For the cardinal’s mission had failed. Well was it for them, well for John Wigton, well for thousands who had yet to hear the word of truth from the lips he sought to silence. But was it well for George Wishart? That is not so clear. Little cause indeed had he to fear the assassin’s knife. Had the murderer done his worst, it would still have been—

“But one step for those victorious feet, From their day’s walk into the golden street!”

Only a moment’s shock, a death-pang scarcely felt,—then a joyful waking in his Saviour’s presence. Were not this better far for him than the dark and painful path he was destined to tread? Yet no. “The righteous, and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God,” and best in the end for them the ways He chooses are sure to prove. Those who, in all ages, have dared to resign themselves to his guidance, have borne triumphant witness to the Light that illumined and the Hand that led them throughout. Many doubtless there are on earth, who, bending wearily beneath the weight of the cross, wish that weight were lightened; but we may be sure that amongst the white-robed choir before the throne there stands not one who would now be willing to have had his cross less heavy, or to have done or suffered the least fraction less for his Master’s sake.

X. =What became of the Cardinal’s Missionary.=

“Oh, if before thy death, our God Will thee reclaim and own; No dearer face than thine I’ll hail, Around his judgment throne.” REV. R. S. BROOKE.

X. =What became of the Cardinal’s Missionary.=

It was late in the afternoon, but Mary had not yet left her room, nor would she admit even Janet. To the anxious inquiries of her friends she only answered that she was not ill, and that she would come to them by and by, but she needed rest and wished to be alone. In the meantime Archie told his brother all that had happened; and it may well be guessed the story did not lose any of its striking features by his telling.

Jamie, who was considerably better, was amusing himself by walking up and down the hall and passages of the house, when some one knocked gently at the street door. Being near at the moment, he had it opened before Archie, the usual porter, could bound down the stairs for the purpose. But had Mary heard that knock, she would at once have recognised it, and with her will no hand save her own should have opened the door.

A gentlemanly person, unknown to Jamie, stepped inside. He had just asked the stranger what he wanted, when, to his equal surprise and horror, Archie sprang at the man’s throat like a wild cat, his fair boyish face darkened by a scowl of positive hatred.

“Hae ye tint yer senses, callant?” cried Jamie, exerting all his strength, which at the time was not great, to drag them asunder.

“Haud yer hand aff!” shouted Archie. “Yon’s the loon wha hae tried to kill Maister Wishart.”

Jamie, however, succeeded in separating them, but only in time to save Wigton (who seemed to lack the spirit to resist his youthful assailant) from a severe fall.

“Is that true, sir?” he demanded then, much in the tone of a judge interrogating a prisoner.

The unfortunate man raised his eyes for a moment to those of his questioner, then dropped them again as if unable to bear his gaze, and after making an ineffectual effort to speak, turned quickly towards the door. But Archie, either from accident or design, was standing directly between him and it.

“Let him pass, brither,” cried Jamie; then turning to Wigton with a manner expressive of the most bitter contempt and loathing, “Nae hand o’ ours sall be upon ye, traitor tho’ ye are, for his sake wha askit yer life; but tak’ yer foot frae an honest man’s threshold.”

John Wigton hesitated, and, to do him justice, his thoughts at the moment were not selfish ones. His natural impulse would have been to say, “Where’s Mary Wigton? She is my sister.” He had counted upon her affection, sorely as it had been tried, for the shelter or the disguise which might yet be necessary to save his life. But were it well done to betray their relationship, and thus perhaps to deprive her of the only friends now remaining to her on earth? For he himself, as friend or foe, must henceforward count as nothing.

Archie eagerly flung the door wide open, Jamie sternly watched to see him go, but still he stood irresolute. At last, looking full in the young man’s honest though angry face, he said boldly, “Gin ye fear God, and pity the unfortunate, let me bide here the nicht.”

Jamie’s eyes flashed, “An’ I do I’ll be——,” and there he stopped abruptly, and bit his lip until the blood came; for an evil word had well-nigh escaped him unawares. But presently his anger changed to disdain. “What hae ye got to fear, gin it’s no yer ain ill conscience, ye puir spirited loon? The law ’ill no touch a hair o’ yer head, sin’ (God forgie the wicked men wha hae done it) Maister Wishart’s been put to the horn.[12] Ye kenned that unco weel, ye dastard, when ye thocht to raise yer hand against his life.”

Wigton unconsciously answered him almost in the very words of the first murderer. “But aebody wha finds me ’ill kill me.”

“Ye suld hae thocht o’ that afore ye took sic’ a bluidy trade in hand,” said Jamie scornfully.

“Dinna fash yersel wi’ his clavers,” cried Archie. “Fling him across the street!”

“Whisht, Archie!—Gin ye’re sae fear’t for yersel”—

“I do fear,” said Wigton, in a low voice. “I darena dee—_no just yet_.”

Jamie looked at him steadily, and the hard expression of his face began to soften a little. “Be you a Dundee man?” he asked.

“Na.”

“God be thankit for the same! I couldna thole the thocht that _he_ had come amang us, sae brave and kind, to do us a’ the guid he might for soul and body, and that we had sought to pay him—wi’ the murderer’s knife! I was aye proud to be a Dundee man, but I thocht to-day I maun be shamed of it. Weel, that’s bye. What for can ye no gang hame? The sooner ye free the toon o’ the presence of a traitor carl, the better.”

“Daur I pass the gate in this gear?” asked John Wigton.

Jamie had no answer to this question ready. It had now become clear to him that the unhappy man was really in danger, and that either a change of clothing or a night’s lodging was absolutely necessary to give him a reasonable chance of safety. But what was that to him? For one short moment he was glad—glad to think that, without overt act of his, the man who had raised his cruel hand against the life so dear to them all should pay the just forfeit of his crime. But then another thought came to him,—and he stood irresolute, gazing on the pale troubled face before him.

After a short pause, he turned abruptly and opened the door of the room where Wigton once before had passed the night. “Gang in there,” he said; “I maun think.” About to walk hastily upstairs, he fortunately recollected Archie, and mindful of the explosion that would certainly follow if he were left with that man, he seized the boy by his collar, and marched him before him with little ceremony and much decision.

Whilst Archie told the astonished Janet who was in the house, Jamie walked silently to the window and stood there, his head resting on his hands. Not long since had his heart’s choice been made to serve and follow his Master Christ; and this was the first time his faith had been put to the proof by the solemn question, “Shall I do in this matter the thing that _I_ please, or shall I deny myself, and do the will of Christ my Saviour?” What that will was, he could not doubt. He from whose lips he had learned “the mercies of God,” was very earnest and explicit in beseeching those who tasted them to yield themselves living sacrifices, holy, acceptable unto him. “If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink;”—Jamie well knew the words, and felt them at that moment directly addressed to him. But his eyes were resting on the spot where so lately Wishart had knelt by his sick bed in prayer; the Book he had given lay near him on the table; and all the blessed words or help and healing, all the noble deeds of Christian love, which he and others owed to him, came crowding on his memory. A personal wrong would have been, oh how easy to pardon! But to attempt his life—_his_! That was too cruel; it was beyond all pardon. He had yet to learn the last and hardest lesson of Christian charity (witness any who have tried it)—to forgive the injuries done to those we love and reverence. But then, who possessed, after all, the right to decide the question, and to dispose of the man’s life? And had not he, in the plainest possible manner, already made known his decision! This thought softened him; his lip trembled, and a mist came over his dark eye.

At last he spoke aloud, but as if addressing himself: “I’ll do it, sin’ Maister Wishart willed it thus.”

“Oh, Jamie!” cried Janet, who for some moments had been watching him earnestly, “dinna do it for Maister Wishart’s sake, but for the guid Lord Jesus, wha prayed on the cross for his murderers!”

Jamie was surprised at this burst of feeling from the ordinarily reserved and silent Janet. But not the less had the arrow she sped winged its way to his heart. “Ye’re richt, lass,” he said, in an altered tone. Then, turning to the large “kist” which did duty as the family wardrobe, he began to ransack its contents with a hasty hand.

“What gars ye make sic’ a litter?” asked Janet, subsiding in a moment into her ordinary sphere of common life and practical activity. “Tell _me_ what ye’re seeking, an’ I’ll find it for ye without turning aething topside down.”

But Jamie silently held up the object of his search—a suit of coarse clothing which he had been accustomed to wear when about his daily work.

Just then Mary entered the room, looking very pale. She had heard the loud voices in the passage, and at once the idea occurred to her that her brother might have ventured to the house. As hitherto, in compliance with his own request, she had always been careful to watch for his knock and to admit him herself, he would naturally calculate upon this. Alarmed at the thought of his being recognised by any one else, she was going down to meet him, when, in passing by the open door of the Duncans’ room, she overheard part of their conversation.

“Jamie,” she said, in a low but tolerably calm voice, “yon man is my brither, John Wigton.”

Janet and Archie uttered exclamations of surprise, perhaps of horror. Jamie remained silent, but drew his hand across his face.

Mary’s soft eyes were fixed on that shaded face with a wistful inquiring gaze, very touching in its sorrowful earnestness. “Do _you_ indeed despise me?” they seemed to ask.

At length Jamie spoke, and in that peculiarly gentle tone which a keen observer might have noticed he never used except in addressing her: “Mary, lass,” he said, “wad ye rather see him again or no?”

“I maun see him, Jamie.”

“Then bring him thae bit claes; an’ he wants meat or drink, ye ken whaur to get it.”

“God bless ye,” answered Mary; and taking the clothes with her, she left the room.

Mere courage, or the absence of it, is not always a fair test of a man’s moral condition. That morning John Wigton had been ready enough to brave a violent death; that evening, he was willing to do or suffer almost anything in order to retain for a little longer.

“The poor common privilege of breathing.”

But in the meantime a revolution had passed over him; and the man who shrank from death was in some respects better and wiser than the man who faced it fearlessly. His daring had been the offspring of ignorance and superstition; his fears were at least reasonable. A weight of conscious guilt was on his soul, how then could he venture to enter his Maker’s presence?

He was sitting at the table, his head bowed down between his hands, when Mary entered the room, came towards him, and said softly, “Brither.”

He started and looked up, but in an instant afterwards his head sank and he covered his face again.

“I’ll no reproach ye,” said Mary, her voice trembling, “but gin it’s no wrang to think it, I could wish God wad hae taken me hame afore this bitter day. Brither, brither—what gared ye dream o’ sic’ a deed?”

“I hae nae will to blame him that bade me do the wark, my ain guilt is owre heavy for that,” he answered; and Mary saw that his heart was crushed within him.

“Thank God it was nae waur,” she said gently; “it gars me grue to think what micht hae been the day.”

“Sister, ye were richt. Maister Wishart preaches the true Word o’ God. Miserable sinner that I am, I hae focht against God himsel!”

“God can pardon, brither.”

“Oh ay, he can, but I sair misdoot,—atweel, Mary, we maun part the noo for aye and aye. Ye ken yersel it’s better sae.”

Mary did not deny it. Tearless, but with a look more sad than many tears, she answered, “Brither, I’ll pray for ye night, noon, and morn—I’ll nae mair forget yer name than I could _his_ whase life ye sought. And I hope in God’s mercy we’ll meet ainst again at his right hand.”

“Then we part friends, Mary?” said Wigton, extending his hand.

“Oh ay,” replied Mary quickly; but a sudden thought of the deed that hand had been about to do overcame her at the moment, and she hesitated to take it.

“Ye willna touch me,” said her brother. “_He_ took me in his arms.”

Overpowered by the recollection, he buried his face once more in his hands and wept aloud. George Wishart’s forgiving love had conquered. All the ice of fanaticism, that for years had been gathering around the heart of Wigton, melted beneath its beams in a single hour. Since he left his father’s home he had scarcely known what it was to weep; for men who harden their hearts as he did, do not often yield to the softening thoughts that bring tears. But now he was sobbing like a child; not for sorrow, not for shame, not even for the sense of sin, but only at the memory of those arms clasped around him—that voice pleading for him—“Whosoever shall trouble him troubles me.” And he had hated the man so bitterly, had believed so firmly that by killing him he should do God service! Truly, as Martin Luther said, “Satan cannot cast out Satan,” nor hate vanquish hate, “but the finger of God, which is love, will do it.”

When men weep thus they do not soon grow calm again. Mary saw that every nerve in her brother’s frame was quivering with emotion. She came very close to him _now_, wound her arms about his neck and pressed her lips to his. “God will pardon thee,” she said again.

“God’s servant pardoned,” murmured Wigton.

“An’ I dinna think the Maister’s ain heart ’ill be less full o’ love than the servant’s. Whaur but frae the blessed Lord himsel did Maister Wishart learn to forgie like that? Gin _he_, wha ye thocht to kill, could shield ye wi’ his ain body frae them that sought yer life, ye may ken for sure that the guid Lord ’ill no refuse, an’ ye turn to him, to tak’ ye in _his_ arms and keep ye safe frae scathe and harm.”

“O Mary, what a refuge for the like o’ me! Na—na—it’s owre guid.” And he shook his head despondingly.

“He saves to the uttermost, he forgies e’en the chief o’ sinners,” answered Mary.

“But I maun gang,” said Wigton, rising. “It’s wearing late, and they’ll hae shut the gates.”

Mary gave him the clothes she brought, and proffered food, which he declined. He changed his dress in a small adjacent room where Mary used herself to sleep before her father’s death; and then returning to her, said, “I dinna think aebody’s like to ken me noo, forbye it’s weel nigh dark.”

“Could ye no bide here the nicht, John?”

“I daurna; an’ what guid wad it do?”

“Will ye no tell me whaur ye’re gaun?”

“I dinna just ken mysel. But I ken unco weel whaur I’m no like to gang, and that’s to St. Andrews. Aebody’s hand ’ill be again me noo; and my lord the Cardinal wad gie me sharp thanks for this morn’s wark.”

Mary shuddered. “He maun be a bluidy blackhearted man, God forgie him,” she said. “What gars him hate guid Maister Wishart, wha never did him or ony man harm?”