ROB had not been so light of heart since he made that momentous decision about his profession which had so strangely changed his life. For the first time since then he felt himself an allowed and authorized person, not in disgrace or under disapprobation of all men, as he had hitherto been; and the permission to carry his drawing of the Kirkton to Miss Margaret “in a present” amused him, while it gave at the same time a certain sanction to his engagement to meet her, and show her the other productions of his pencil. Rob had his wits about him more than Margaret had, though not so much as his mother. He was aware that to ask a young lady to meet him at the burn, for what purpose soever, was not exactly what was becoming, and that the advantage he had taken of their childish friendship was perhaps not quite so “like a gentleman” as he wished to be. He could not, indeed, persuade himself that his mother was any authority in such a question; but still the fact that she thought it quite natural that he should carry on his old relations with Margaret, and even encouraged him to make the young lady a present, gave him a sort of fictitious satisfaction. He would affect to take his mother’s opinion as his authority, if his conduct was called in question, and thus her ignorance was a bulwark to him. He went out again after his broth, and worked diligently all the afternoon, though Mrs. Glen thought it very unnecessary.
“’Twill just spoil it,” she said. “The like of you never knows where to stop: either you do nothing at all, or you do a hantle o’er much.”
But on this point Rob took his own way. Certainly, even when you despise the opinion of those around, it is good to be thought well off. The moral atmosphere was lighter round him, and there was the pleasant prospect of meeting Margaret in the evening, and receiving the delightful incense of her admiration; a more agreeable way of filling up this interval of leisure could not have been devised, had his leisure been the most legitimate, the most natural in the world.
While he sat at his drawing in the breezy afternoon, a further sign of the rehabilitation he had undergone was accorded to him. Voices approaching him through the garden, which lay between the house and the west green, prepared him for visitors, and these voices were too familiar to leave him in doubt who the visitors were. It was the Minister, whom Mrs. Glen was leading to the spot where her son was at work on his drawing. “I’ll no say that I expected much,” said Mrs. Glen, “for I’m not one that thinks everything fine that’s done by my ain. I think I’m a’ the mair hard to please; but, Doctor, when I saw upon the paper the very Kirkton itsel’! Losh me! there wasn’t a house but you would have kent it. Robert Jamieson’s and Hugh Macfarlane’s, just as like as if you had been standing afore them. It clean beats me how a lad can do that, that has had little time for anything but his studies; for, Doctor, I never heard but that my Rob was a good student. He hasna come to a good issue, which is awfu’ mysterious; but a good student he aye was, and there’s no a man that kens who will say me nay.”
“I am well aware of that,” said Dr. Burnside. “It makes it all the more mysterious, as you well say; but let us hope that time and thought will work a change. I’m not one to condemn a young man because he has troubles of mind. We’ve all had our experiences,” the good man said, as he came through the opening in the hedge to the west green, which was nothing more imposing than the “green,” technically so called, in which the farmer’s household dried its clothes—a green, or, to speak more circumstantially, “a washing green,” a square of grass on which the linen could be bleached if necessary, and with posts at each corner for the ropes on which it was suspended to dry, being a necessity of every house in Fife, and throughout Scotland. There was no linen hung out at present to share the breezy green with Rob. He sat on the grass on a three-legged stool he had brought with him; a low hedge ran round the little enclosure, with a little burn purling under its shadow, and beyond were the green fields and the village, with all its reds and blues. Behind him an old ash-tree fluttered its branches and sheltered him from the sun.
“Well, Robert, and how do you do?” said Dr. Burnside. “I have come out to see you, at your mother’s instance. She tells me you’ve developed a great genius for painting. I am very happy to hear of it, but I hope you will not let the siren art lead you away from better things.”
“What are better things?” said Rob; “I don’t know any,” and he got up to respond to the Minister’s salutation. Dr. Burnside shook his head.
“That is what I feared,” he said. “You must not give up for painting, or any other pleasure of this earth, the higher calling you were first bound to, my good lad. You’ve served your time to the Church, and what if you have passing clouds that trouble your spirit? Having put your hand to the plough, you must not turn back.”
“Eh, that’s what I tell him every day o’ his life,” said Mrs. Glen.
“I came on purpose to have a long conversation with you,” said the Minister. “Yes, very pretty, very pretty. I am no judge of paintings myself, but I’ve no doubt it’s very well done. I need not tell you I’m very sorry for all that’s come and gone; but I cannot give up the hope, Robert, that you will see the error of your ways. I cannot think a promising lad like you will continue in a wrong road.”
“If it is a wrong road,” said Rob.
“Whisht, lad, and hearken what the Minister says; but before I go in, Doctor, look at the picture. Is’t no wonderful? There’s your ain very trees, and the road we’ve ga’en to the kirk as long as I can mind, and a’ the whigmaleeries of the auld steeple. Na, I put nae faith in it at first, no me! but when I saw it, just a bit senseless paper, good for nothin’ in itsel’! Take a good look at it, Doctor. It’s no like the kind of thing ye’ll see every day.”
“Yes, Mrs. Glen,” said the Minister, “I do not doubt it is very pretty. I am no judge myself. I would like to hear what Sir Claude would say; he is a great connoisseur. But it was not about pictures, however pretty, that I was wanting to speak to Robert. My good lad, put away your bonnie view and all your paints for a moment, and take a walk down to the Manse with me. I would like to satisfy myself how you stand, and perhaps a little conversation might be of use. There is nothing so good for clearing the cobwebs out of the mind, as just entering into the state of the case with a competent person, one that understands you, and knows what to advise.”
“That is what I aye said when all thae professors in Glasgow was taighling at him; the Doctor at hame would understand far better, that is what I aye said. Go with the Minister, Rob, and pay great attention. I’ll carry in the things. But I wish ye would take a good look at the picture, Doctor; and ye’ll no keep him too long, for he has a friend to see, and two-three things to do. You’ll mind that, Rob, my man.”
Never since the fatal letter which disclosed his apostasy had his mother addressed him before as “my man.” And Rob knew that the Doctor was not strong in argument. He went with him across the fields he had just been putting into his sketch, with an easy mind. He was fond of discussion, like every true-born Scotsman, and here at least he was pretty sure of having the victory. Mrs. Glen, for her part, carried in “the paints” with a certain reverence. She put the sketch against the wall of the parlor, and contemplated it with pride, which was a still warmer sentiment than her pleasure. It was “our Rob” that had done that; nobody else in the country-side was so clever. It was true that Sir Claude was a connoisseur, as the Minister said, and was supposed to know a great deal about art, but nobody had ever seen a picture of his to be compared with this of “our Rob’s.” Mrs. Glen set the sketch against the wall, and got her knitting and sat down opposite to it, not to worship, but to build castles upon that foundation, which was not much more satisfactory than Alnascher’s basket of eggs. The thought passed through her mind, indeed, that he who could do so much in this accidental and chance way, what might he not have done had he followed out his original vocation? which was a grievous thought. But then it never could have been in Rob’s way to be Archbishop of Canterbury, or anything but a parish minister, like the Doctor himself; whereas, perhaps, with this unsuspected new gift, and out of his very idleness and do-nothingness, who could tell what might come? Mrs. Glen’s imagination was of a vulgar kind, but it enabled her to follow out a perfectly feasible and natural line of events, and to settle what her own line of conduct was to be with admirable good sense: not to press him, not to put herself forward as arranging anything, not to interfere with the young lady, but to wait and see how things would happen. Nothing could be more simple. The end was a mist of confusion before the farmer-woman’s eyes. Perhaps she fell asleep, nodding over her half-knitted stocking in the drowsiness of the afternoon; but if so, a vague vision of “our Rob” turned into Sir Robert, and reigning at Earl’s-hall, glistened at the end of that vista. How he could be Sir Robert, by what crown matrimonial he could be invested with the title and the lands of which Ludovic Leslie, and not Margaret, was the heir, we need not try to explain. The dreamer herself could not have explained it, nor did she try; and perhaps she had fallen asleep, and was not accountable for the fancies that had got into her drowsy brain.
As for Rob, he had a long conversation with the Minister, and posed him as he had intended and foreseen. Dr. Burnside’s theology was ponderous, and his information a trifle out of date. Even in the ordinary way of reasoning, his arguments were more apt to unsettle the minds of good believers and make the adversary rejoice, than to produce any more satisfactory result; and it may be supposed that he was not very well prepared for the young sceptic, trained in new strongholds of learning which the good Doctor knew but by name. Dr. Burnside shook his puzzled head when he went into the Manse to tea. “Yon’s a clever lad,” he said to his wife. “I sometimes think the devil always gets the cleverest.”
“Well, Doctor,” said Mrs. Burnside, who was a very strong theologian, “have you forgotten that the foolish things of this earth are to confound the strong?”
But the Doctor only shook his head. He did not like to think of himself as one of the foolish things of this earth, even though by so doing he might have a better hope of confounding the audacious strength of Rob Glen. But he pondered much upon the subject, and polished up his weapons in private, going through many an argument in his own mind, which was more successful, and preparing snares and pitfalls for the young heretic. He had patronized Rob when Rob was orthodox, but he respected him now as he had never done before.
“I think I will preach my sermon on the fig-tree next Sabbath morning,” he said to his wife after tea. “I think that will stagger him, if anything can.”
“Well, Doctor,” Mrs. Burnside replied, “it will always be a pleasure to hear it; but I fear Robert Glen is one of those whose ears are made heavy, that they cannot hear.”
The Doctor shook his head again, out of respect to the Scriptures; but he was not so hopeless. Perhaps he believed in his sermon on the fig-tree more than his wife did, and he felt that to gain back the young man who had baffled him would be indeed a crown of glory. He spent an hour in his study that night looking up other sermons which specially suited the case. It gave him an interest in his sermons which he had not felt since Sir Claude gave up coming to the parish church, and seceded to the Episcopal chapel in St. Rule’s. That had been a distressing event to the good Doctor, but he had got over it, and now providence had been kind enough to send him a young unbeliever to convince. Perhaps the good folks of the Kirkton and the parish generally would have heard of this looking up of the old discourses with some apprehension; but the Doctor wrote a new introduction to the sermon on the fig-tree, and that was some little gain at least.
Rob left his pastor with less respectfulness than the good Doctor felt for him. After running the gauntlet of the professors, and receiving all the attention he had received as the representative of honest doubt, it is not to be supposed that Dr. Burnside could impress him much, and he took up a great deal of time with his feeble argumentations. When, however, the Minister invited him to come to the Manse to tea, Rob made a very pretty speech about his mother. “She has been very kind to me, though I know I have disappointed her,” he said, “and I must not leave her alone. I don’t think I can leave her alone.”
“That’s the finest thing you’ve said, Robert,” said the Doctor. “I see your heart is right, although your head is all wrong;” and with this they parted, and the good man came in to look over his sermons. As for Rob, he hurried home to collect some sketch-books for Margaret’s benefit, and would not share his mother’s tea, notwithstanding his pretty speech. But it was astonishing how tolerant Mrs. Glen had grown. She shook her head, but she did not insist upon the bread-and-butter.
“I’ll have something ready for your supper if you havena time now,” she said; and entreated him to take the block with to-day’s drawing, which she thought might be offered “in a present” to the young lady.
“Not that, mother,” said Rob, “not till it is finished.”
“Finished!” she said, with a disdain which was complimentary; “what would you have? You canna mend it. It’s just the Kirkton itsel’.”
And she would have liked him to put on his best black coat when he went to meet Miss Margaret, and the tall hat he wore on Sundays. “When you have good claes, why should ye no wear them? She should see that you ken the fashion and can keep the fashion with the best—as my poor purse will feel when the bill comes in,” she added, with a sigh. But at last Rob managed to escape in his ordinary garments, and with the sketches he had chosen. After the events of the day, which had been a kind of crisis in his career, Rob’s mind was full of a pleasant excitement; all things seemed once more to promise well for him—if only this little lady of romance would keep her promise. Would she come again? or had he been flattering himself, supposing a greater interest in her mind than really existed, or a greater freedom in her movements? He lingered about for some time, watching the sun as it lighted up the west, and began to paint the sky with crimson and purple; and as he watched it, Rob was natural enough and innocent enough to forget most other things. Who could attempt to put that sky upon paper? There was all the fervor of first love in his enthusiasm for art, and as he pondered what color could give some feeble idea of such a sky, he thought no more of Margaret. What impossible combination could do it? And if it was done, who would believe in it? He looked at the growing glory with that despair of the artist which is in itself a worship. Rob was not an artist to speak of, yet he had something of the “feeling” which makes one, and all the enthusiasm of a beginner just able to make some expression of his delight in the beauty round him; and there is no one who sees that beauty so clearly, and all the unimaginable glories of the atmosphere, the clouds and shadows, the wonderful varieties of color of which our northern heaven is capable, as the artist, however humble. He was absorbed in this consideration, wondering how to do it, wondering if he ever could succeed in catching that tone of visionary light, that touch of green amidst the blue—or whether he would not be condemned as an impostor if he tried, when suddenly his book of sketches was softly drawn out of his hand. Looking round with a start, he saw Margaret by his side. She had stolen upon him ere he was aware, and her laugh at having taken him by surprise changed into her habitual sudden blush as she caught his eye.
“You need not mind me,” she said, confused. “I am very happy, looking at the pictures. Are you trying to make a picture out of that sky?”
“If I could,” he said; “but I don’t know how to do it; and if I did, it would not be believed, though people see the sunset every day. Did you ever see a Turner, Miss Margaret? Do you know he was the greatest artist—one of the greatest artists?”
“I have heard his name; but I never saw any pictures, never one except our own, and a few in other houses. I have heard, or rather I have read that name. Did he paint landscapes like you?”
“Like me!” Rob laughed. “You don’t know what you are saying. I am a poor creature, a beginner, a fellow that knows nothing. But he!—and he is very fond of sunsets, and paints them; but he dared no more have done that—”
Margaret looked up curiously into the western heavens. It was “all aflame,” and the glow of it threw a warm reflection upon her as she looked up wistfully, with a look of almost infantile, suddenly awakened wonder. Her face was very grave, startled, and full of awe, like one of Raphael’s child-angels. The idea was new to her. She, who thought these sketches so much more interesting than the sunset, it gave her a new sensation to hear of the great artist who had never dared to represent that which the careless heavens accomplish every day. Some floating conception of the greatness of that great globe of sky and air which kept herself suspended a very atom in its vastness, and of the littleness of any man’s attempt at representing it, came suddenly upon her, then floated away again, leaving her as eager as ever over Rob Glen’s poor little sketches. She turned them over with hurried hands. Some were of scenes she did not know, the lochs and hills of the West Highlands, which filled her with delight, and now and then an old tumble-down house, which interested her less.
“Would you like to draw Earl’s-hall?” she said. “I know you have it done in the distance. But it is grand in the distance, and close at hand it is not so grand, it is only funny. Perhaps you could make a picture, Mr.—Glen, of Earl’s-hall?”
“I should very much like to try. Might I try? Perhaps Sir Ludovic might not like it.”
“Papa likes what I like,” said Margaret. But then she paused. “There is Bell. You know Bell, Mr.—Glen.”
She made a little pause before his name, and he smiled. Perhaps it was better that she should not be so easily familiar and call him Rob. The touch of embarrassment was more attractive.
“Bell,” she added, with a little furtive smile, avoiding his look, “is more troublesome than papa; and she will go and speak to papa when she takes it into her head.”
“Then you do not like Bell? I am wrong, I am very wrong; I see it. You did not mean that!”
“Not like—Bell? What would happen if you did not care for those that belong to you?”
“But Bell is only your servant—only your house-keeper.”
Margaret closed the sketch-book, and looked at him with indignant eyes.
“I cannot tell you what Bell is,” she said. “She is just Bell. She took care of my mother, and she takes care of me. Who would be like Bell to me, if it were the Queen? But sometimes she scolds,” she added, suddenly, coming down in a moment from her height of seriousness; “and if you come to Earl’s-hall, you must make friends with Bell. I will tell her you want to draw the house. She would like to see a picture of the house, I am sure she would; and, Mr. Glen,” said Margaret, timidly, looking up in his face, “you promised—but perhaps you have forgotten—you promised to learn me—”
(Learn, by one of the curious turns of meaning not uncommon over the Border, means teach in Scotch, just as to hire means to be hired.)
“Forgotten!” said Rob, his face, too, glowing with the sunset. “If you will only let me! The worst is that you will soon find out how little I know.”
“Not when I look at these beautiful pictures,” said Margaret, opening the sketch-book again. “Tell me where this is. It is a little dark loch, with hills rising and rising all round; here there is a point out into the water with a castle upon it, all dim and dark; but up on the hills the sun is shining. Oh, I would like, I would like to see it! What bonnie places there must be in the world!”
“It is in the Highlands. I wish I could show you the place,” said Rob. “The colors on the hills are far beyond a poor sketch of mine. They are like a beautiful poem.”
Margaret looked up at him again with a misty sweetness in her eyes, a recognition, earnest and happy, of another link of union.
“Do you like poetry too?” she said.