Part 23 (2/2)
I'm that disgust.i.t at mysel 'at I canna luik ye i' the face!”
”Ye didna ken whaur I was! I ran awa that naebody micht ken.”
”What rizzon was there for onybody to ken? I'm sure ye never tellt!”
Isy went to the door and called Maggie. James stared after her, bewildered.
”There was this rizzon,” she said, re-entering with the child, and laying him in James's arms.
He gasped with astonishment, almost consternation.
”Is this mine?” he stammered.
”Yours and mine, sir,” she replied. ”Wasna G.o.d a heap better til me nor I deserved?--Sic a bonnie bairn! No a mark, no a spot upon him frae heid to fut to tell that he had no business to be here!--Gie the bonnie wee man a kiss, Mr. Blatherwick. Haud him close to ye, sir, and he'll tak the pain oot o' yer heart: aften has he taen 't oot o' mine--only it aye cam again!--He's yer ain son, sir! He cam to me bringin the Lord's forgiveness, lang or ever I had the hert to speir for 't. Eh, but we maun dee oor best to mak up til G.o.d's bairn for the wrang we did him afore he was born! But he'll be like his great Father, and forgie us baith!”
As soon as Maggie had given the child to his mother, she went to her father, and sat down beside him, crying softly. He turned on his leather stool, and looked at her.
”Canna ye rejice wi' them that rejice, noo that ye hae nane to greit wi', Maggie, my doo?” he said. ”Ye haena lost ane, and ye hae gaint twa!
Haudna the glaidness back that's sae fain to come to the licht i' yer grudgin hert, Maggie! G.o.d himsel 's glaid, and the Shepherd's glaid, and the angels are a' makin sic a flut-flutter wi' their muckle wings 'at I can 'maist see nor hear for them!”
Maggie rose, and stood a moment wiping her eyes. The same instant the door opened, and James entered with the little one in his arms. He laid him with a smile in Maggie's.
”Thank you, sir!” said the girl humbly, and clasped the child to her bosom; nor, after that, was ever a cloud of jealousy to be seen on her face. I will not say she never longed or even wept after the little one, whom she still regarded as her very own, even when he was long gone away with his father and mother; indeed she mourned for him then like a mother from whom death has taken away her first-born and only son; neither did she see much difference between the two forms of loss; for Maggie felt in her heart that life nor death could destroy the relation that already existed between them: she could not be her father's daughter and not understand that! Therefore, like a bereaved mother, she only gave herself the more to her father.
I will not dwell on the delight of James and Isobel, thus restored to each other, the one from a sea of sadness, the other from a gulf of perdition. The one had deserved many stripes, the other but a few: needful measure had been measured to each; and repentance had brought them together.
Before James left the house, the soutar took him aside, and said--
”Daur I offer ye a word o' advice, sir?”
”'Deed that ye may!” answered the young man with humility: ”and I dinna see hoo it can be possible for me to hand frae deein as ye tell me; for you and my father and Isy atween ye, hae jist saved my vera sowl!”
”Weel, what I wad beg o' ye is, that ye tak no further step o' ony consequence, afore ye see Maister Robertson, and mak him acquant wi the haill affair.”
”I'm vera willin,” answered James; ”and I doobtna Isy 'ill be content.”
”Ye may be vera certain, sir, that she'll be naething but pleased: she has a gran' opingon, and weel she may, o' Maister Robertson. Ye see, sir, I want ye to put yersels i' the han's o' a man that kens ye baith, and the half o' yer story a'ready--ane, that is, wha'll jeedge ye truly and mercifully, and no condemn ye affhan'. Syne tak his advice what ye oucht to dee neist.”
”I will--and thank you, Mr. MacLear! Ae thing only I houp--that naither you, sir, nor he will ever seek to pursuaud me to gang on preachin. Ae thing I'm set upon, and that is, to deliver my sowl frae hypocrisy, and walk softly a' the rest o' my days! Happy man wad I hae been, had they set me frae the first to caw the pleuch, and cut the corn, and gether the stooks intil the barn--i'stead o' creepin intil a leaky boat to fish for men wi' a foul and tangled net! I'm affront.i.t and jist scunnert at mysel!--Eh, the presumption o' the thing! But I hae been weel and richteously punished! The Father drew his han' oot o' mine, and loot me try to gang my lane; sae doon I cam, for I was fit for naething but to fa': naething less could hae broucht me to mysel--and it took a lang time! I houp Mr. Robertson will see the thing as I dee mysel!--Wull I write and speir him oot to Stanecross to advise wi my father aboot Isy?
That would bring him! There never was man readier to help!--But it's surely my pairt to gang to _him_, and mak my confession, and boo til his judgment!--Only I maun tell Isy first!”
Isy was not only willing, but eager that Mr. and Mrs. Robertson should know everything.
”But be sure,” she added, ”that you let them know you come of yourself, and I never asked you.”
Peter said he could not let him go alone, but must himself go with him, for he was but weakly yet--and they must not put it off a single day, lest anything should transpire and be misrepresented.
The news which father and son carried them, filled the Robertsons with more than pleasure; and if their reception of him made James feel the repentant prodigal he was, it was by its heartiness, and their jubilation over Isy.
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