Part 16 (1/2)

It would be dreadful not to bid you good-bye.

YOUR ADA.

Four o'clock! It was then a quarter after three; there was barely time to reach the station, but half-a-crown to the driver gave him five minutes in which to see his beautiful mistress in her new winter gown of dark blue broadcloth, trimmed with sable fur. The small blue and brown toque above her brown, braided hair gave her quite a new look. She was so chic, so radiant, so loving. And, in some of the occult ways known to women, she managed in those few minutes to make him both happy and hopeful. Then the guard held open the door of her carriage, she was in the train, the door was shut, the cry of ”All right” ran along the moving line and, with a heart feeling empty and forlorn, he returned to the Little House.

”Lady Cramer has gone to London,” he said to Mrs. Caird, and she looked into her brother-in-law's face and understood.

There was nothing now for him but reading, and he took up the books waiting for him and tried to forget in Scientific Religion the pitiless aching and longing of love; and he was glad, also, that the minister who had been filling the pulpit of the Church of the Disciples during his month's rest proposed to come to Cramer and stay part of the last week with him. He hoped they might be able to talk over together some of the startling religious ideas he was then reading and, perhaps, receive help from his more advanced age and wider experience.

Mrs. Caird doubted it as soon as she saw the man. He had a handsome physical appearance with such drawbacks as attend a long course of self-indulgence. His stoutness reduced his height, he had become slightly bald, and he wore gla.s.ses; so Dr. Macrae's slim, straight figure, his fine eyes and hair, and his good, healthy coloring, moved the brother cleric to a moment's envy.

”I used to be as natty and bright as you, Macrae,” he said, ”but age, sir, age--the years tell on us.”

Dr. Macrae met him at the railway station with the Victoria, and he admired the turnout very much. ”That is a fine machine,” he remarked; ”it must have cost you a pretty penny.”

”It is not mine,” answered Dr. Macrae. ”It belongs to Lady Cramer. I have, by her kindness, the use of it this summer.”

”What an unusual kindness!”

”Also of her dower house, with all its beautiful furnis.h.i.+ngs. Very little you will see in it belongs to me.”

”I have never fallen on such luck. My church is large, but poor--poor.

There are a few wealthy families--but--but they do not lift themselves above the ordinaries of collection--the plate and the printed lists.”

”Yes.”

”And, even so, I generally think scorn of their donations. I suppose you are on a very easy footing with Lady Cramer--friendly, I mean.”

”Yes, we are good friends.”

He was in a fit of admiration with everything he saw, the antique homeliness of the parlors, the lavender on the window sills, the Worcester china on the table. He looked critically at the latter, and said with a knowing air, ”It belongs to the best period, having the square mark on it.” The light shone on olives and grapes, on cut gla.s.s and silver, and specially on a claret jug of Worcester, with its exotic birds, its lasting gold, and its scale-blue ground like sapphire. He had the artistic temperament, and these beautiful things appealed to him in a way that astonished Dr. Macrae, whose temperament was of spiritual mold, and had not been dest.i.tute of even ascetic tendencies in his youth.

He had, therefore, little sympathy with his guest's enthusiasms; indeed, it rather pleased him to strip himself bare of all the beauty around him. ”Not one of these lovely things is mine,” he said. ”I should not know what to do with them. I would rather have a few deal shelves full of good books.”

”You don't know yourself, Macrae,” was the answer. ”The possession of artistic beauty develops the taste for it. When you are rich----”

”I shall never be rich.”

”You have a fine income.”

”I save nothing from it; a man who tries to save both his money and his soul has a task too hard for me to manage.”

It must be acknowledged that Mrs. Caird took a dislike to the man, and she made Dr. Macrae feel that it was important he and his visitor should go to Glasgow on Thursday. ”Take him to Bath Street,” she said. ”Maggie will provide for you; besides, I am sending Kitty down to-morrow, and he will be a hindrance to me here.”

Wednesday was very wet and the two ministers had perforce to remain in the house, and in one of the exigencies of their prolonged conversations Dr. Macrae unfortunately referred to the pile of scientific religious books lying on his table. Then his visitor rose and looked at them.

”Yes,” he said with a great sigh, ”we are very scientific to-day, with our 'tendencies' and 'streams of influence' and our various 'thought movements.' They are all purely material.”

”They cannot be that,” replied Dr. Macrae, impetuously. ”Streams of influence imply spiritual beings, and movements of thought must come from thinkers.”

”Agreed,” was the reply, ”but you cannot call 'a stream of tendency,' or 'a power that makes for righteousness,' G.o.d. No, sir, you cannot, without striking at the very foundation of Theism. The next step would be to deny the supernatural guidance of the universe and of life. And the next? What would it be?”