Part 51 (2/2)

To be able to write! Throughout Mr. Ogilvy's life, save when he was about one and twenty, this had seemed the great thing, and he ever approached the thought reverently, as if it were a maid of more than mortal purity. And it is, and because he knew this she let him see her face, which shall ever be hidden from those who look not for the soul, and to help him nearer to her came a.s.sistance in strange guise, the loss of loved ones, dolour unutterable; but still she was beyond his reach.

Night by night, when the only light in the glen was the school-house lamp, of use at least as a landmark to solitary travellers--who miss it nowadays, for it burns no more--she hovered over him, nor did she deride his hopeless efforts, but rather, as she saw him go from black to gray and from gray to white in her service, were her luminous eyes sorrowful because she was not for him, and she bent impulsively toward him, so that once or twice in a long life he touched her fingers, and a heavenly spark was lit, for he had risen higher than himself, and that is literature.

He knew that oblivion was at hand, ready to sweep away his pages almost as soon as they were filled (Do we not all hear her besom when we pause to dip?), but he had done his best and he had a sense of humor, and perhaps some day would come a pupil of whom he could make what he had failed to make of himself. That prodigy never did come, though it was not for want of nursing, and there came at least, in succession most maddening to Mr. Cathro, a row of youths who could be trained to carry the Hugh Blackadder. Mr. Ogilvy's many triumphs in this compet.i.tion had not dulled his appet.i.te for more, and depressed he was at the prospect of a reverse. That it was coming now he could not doubt. McLauchlan, who was to be Rev., had a flow of words (which would prevent his perspiring much in the pulpit), but he could no more describe a familiar scene with the pen than a milkmaid can draw a cow. The Thrums representatives were sometimes as little gifted, it is true, and never were they so well exercised, but this Tommy had the knack of it, as Mr. Ogilvy could not doubt, for the story of his letter-writing had been through the glens.

”Keep up your spirits,” Mr. Lorrimer had said to Mm as they walked together to the fray, ”Cathro's loon may compose the better of the two, but, as I understand, the first years of his life were spent in London, and so he may bogle at the Scotch.”

But the Dominie replied, ”Don't buoy me up on a soap bubble. If there's as much in him as I fear, that should be a help to him instead of a hindrance, for it will have set him a-thinking about the words he uses.”

And the satisfaction on Tommy's face when the subject of the essay was given out, with the business-like way in which he set to work, had added to the Dominie's misgivings; if anything was required to dishearten him utterly it was provided by Cathro's confident smile. The two Thrums ministers were naturally desirous that Tommy should win, but the younger of them was very fond of Mr. Ogilvy, and noticing his unhappy peeps through the door dividing the rooms, proposed that it should be closed. He shut it himself, and as he did so he observed that Tommy was biting his pen and frowning, while McLauchlan, having ceased to think, was getting on nicely. But it did not strike Mr. Dishart that this was worth commenting on.

”Are you not satisfied with the honors you have already got, you greedy man?” he said, laying his hand affectionately on Mr. Ogilvy, who only sighed for reply.

”It is well that the prize should go to different localities, for in that way its sphere of usefulness is extended,” remarked pompous Mr.

Gloag, who could be impartial, as there was no candidate from Noran Side. He was a minister much in request for church soirees, where he amused the congregations so greatly with personal anecdote about himself that they never thought much of him afterwards. There is one such minister in every presbytery.

”And to have carried the Hugh Blackadder seven times running is surely enough for any one locality, even though it be Glenquharity,” said Mr.

Lorrimer, preparing for defeat.

”There's consolation for you, sir,” said Mr. Cathro, sarcastically, to his rival, who tried to take snuff in sheer bravado, but let it slip through his fingers, and after that, until the two hours were up, the talk was chiefly of how Tommy would get on at Aberdeen. But it was confined to the four ministers and one dominie. Mr. Ogilvy still hovered about the door of communication, and his face fell more and more, making Mr. Dishart quite unhappy.

”I'm an old fool,” the Dominie admitted, ”but I can't help being cast down. The fact is that--I have only heard the sc.r.a.pe of one pen for nearly an hour.”

”Poor Lauchlan!” exclaimed Mr. Cathro, rubbing his hands gleefully, and indeed it was such a shameless exhibition that the Auld Licht minister said reproachfully, ”You forget yourself, Mr. Cathro, let us not be unseemly exalted in the hour of our triumph.”

Then Mr. Cathro sat upon his hands as the best way of keeping them apart, but the moment Mr. Dishart's back presented itself, he winked at Mr. Ogilvy. He winked a good deal more presently. For after all--how to tell it! Tommy was ignominiously beaten, making such a beggarly show that the judges thought it unnecessary to take the essays home with them for leisurely consideration before p.r.o.nouncing Mr. Lauchlan McLauchlan winner. There was quite a commotion in the school-room. At the end of the allotted time the two compet.i.tors had been told to hand in their essays, and how Mr. McLauchlan was sn.i.g.g.e.ring is not worth recording, so dumfounded, confused, and raging was Tommy. He clung to his papers, crying fiercely that the two hours could not be up yet, and Lauchlan having tried to keep the laugh in too long it exploded in his mouth, whereupon, said he, with a guffaw, ”He hasna written a word for near an hour!”

”What! It was you I heard!” cried Mr. Ogilvy gleaming, while the unhappy Cathro tore the essay from Tommy's hands. Essay! It was no more an essay than a twig is a tree, for the gowk had stuck in the middle of his second page. Yes, stuck is the right expression, as his chagrined teacher had to admit when the boy was cross-examined. He had not been ”up to some of his tricks,” he had stuck, and his explanations, as you will admit, merely emphasized his incapacity.

He had brought himself to public scorn for lack of a word. What word?

they asked testily, but even now he could not tell. He had wanted a Scotch word that would signify how many people were in church, and it was on the tip of his tongue but would come no farther. Puckle was nearly the word, but it did not mean so many people as he meant. The hour had gone by just like winking; he had forgotten all about time while searching his mind for the word.

When Mr. Ogilvy heard this he seemed to be much impressed, repeatedly he nodded his head as some beat time to music, and he muttered to himself, ”The right word--yes, that's everything,” and ”'the time went by like winking'--exactly, precisely,” and he would have liked to examine Tommy's b.u.mps, but did not, nor said a word aloud, for was he not there in McLauchlan's interest?

The other five were furious; even Mr. Lorrimer, though his man had won, could not smile in face of such imbecility. ”You little tattie doolie,”

Cathro roared, ”were there not a dozen words to wile from if you had an ill-will to puckle? What ailed you at manzy, or--”

”I thought of manzy,” replied Tommy, woefully, for he was ashamed of himself, ”but--but a manse's a swarm. It would mean that the folk in the kirk were buzzing thegither like bees, instead of sitting still.”

”Even if it does mean that,” said Mr. Duthie, with impatience, ”what was the need of being so particular? Surely the art of essay-writing consists in using the first word that comes and hurrying on.”

”That's how I did,” said the proud McLauchlan, who is now leader of a party in the church, and a figure in Edinburgh during the month of May.

”I see,” interposed Mr. Gloag, ”that McLauchlan speaks of there being a mask of people in the church. Mask is a fine Scotch word.”

”Admirable,” a.s.sented Mr. Dishart. ”I thought of mask,” whimpered Tommy, ”but that would mean the kirk was crammed, and I just meant it to be middling full.”

”Flow would have done,” suggested Mr. Lorrimer.

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