Chapter VI: The Glint of the Heather

Charlie dropped in for supper that evening. I don't remember whether or not he was specially invited and it doesn't matter. He came while everybody except myself was in the last stages of preparation for the evening meal; I was in the hall as he came in.

The first thing that caught his eye--after me--was the clerical hat that hung between two of uncle's broad-rimmed grays. He put it on and made very merry over it. It was decidedly too large for him too; as soon as he noticed that, he tipped it jauntily to the back of his head--even then it looked big. The Reverend Gordon's attic was certainly the best room in his bodily edifice.

"Your elder didn't turn up?" said Charlie.

"No, he didn't come."

"And you got the clergyman?"

I nodded.

"Up-stairs right now?"

"Yes."

"In the attic?"

"That's where he is."

Charlie returned the hat to its peg. Then he took off his overcoat, disclosing a faultless evening dress, for the theatre was our objective point that night.

"What kind of a cove is this parson?" he enquired carelessly.

"He's about your age," said I.

"Nice?"

"Uncle thinks so," I answered cautiously.

"How does your mother like him--has she looked him over?"

"I really don't know--he's only been here an hour or two. You certainly do look nice to-night, Charlie."

"How long is this cleric going to stay?" he pursued.

"I don't know. I heard uncle telling him to stay as long as he could."

"What denomination is he?"

"Belongs to the true church," said I.

"I thought Mr. Furvell said he was Presbyterian."

"So he is--he's from Edinburgh. And he's vastly interested in the darkies. They don't grow 'em over there, it seems. He got on pretty thin ice with uncle--they were talking the nigger problem."

"They must have been hard up for conversation," said Mr. Giddens, with a little curl of the lip.

"But they weren't," I protested; "he's a splendid talker--hush, there he's coming now," as I heard a footfall on the stair. "Come and meet him."

I introduced the two men to each other. They stood talking a little in the hall--and I watched them while I listened. Charlie was in full dress, as I have said, with diamond accompaniment; Mr. Laird was in his clericals. They stood close together, chatting very pleasantly; I thought I had never seen two finer types of men, both strong and straight and tall--though Charlie wasn't quite so tall. The Southerner had the keenest face, I thought, bright and animated, with eager, penetrating eyes, and his whole bearing was that of a high-minded and successful man of the world. They were discussing "futures" at the time, I think, suggested doubtless by preliminary remarks about the weather and the prospect of the cotton crop. I know I was surprised to observe that the Reverend Gordon Laird was by no means ignorant of the subject; strange subject, too, when you come to think of it--_futures_, which comprise a great deal more than cotton!

Perhaps Charlie had the keener face, as I have said, but there was more of insight in Mr. Laird's. His were the more wistful eyes, as if they were looking for something not to be found on the surface. And really, of the two, the Scotchman seemed to be doing the most of the inspecting; I mean, by that, that Charlie didn't appear to have the slightest chance to patronize him, as business men are so apt to do with clergymen. For the minister, his clerical coat and collar to the contrary notwithstanding, impressed one as having a certain order of business that was just as important as the other's; and he seemed to pride himself on it, too, in a reserved sort of way. In fact, I should hardly say this at all, since I don't know exactly how I could defend it--but there was an undefinable something about him that made one feel Mr. Laird reckoned his work quite as necessary to the world's good as that of any prosperous business man, even of a wealthy ship-owner from Savannah.

"Have you been long in our country, sir?" Mr. Giddens took advantage of the first pause to enquire.

"No," said the other. "I'm quite a tenderfoot--it's only two weeks since I landed at New York. I came straight South to see Dr. Paine; he took a post-graduate session in Edinburgh, and I met him there. We scraped up quite a friendship--and that's how I came to visit him."

"Do you sail from New York, returning, Mr. Laird?" I ventured, thinking I ought to bear some part in the conversation.

"That's all very uncertain," he answered thoughtfully; "I've been in communication with the Colonial Committee; and it's just possible I may take work in Canada. They're sorely in need of men there, it seems."

"It's a wonderful country," pronounced Charlie; "I spent a week once between Montreal and Quebec. There's untold wealth in Canada, if it were only exploited."

"That's what I have heard," said Mr. Laird; "and I'd like to lend a hand," he added quietly, the earnestness of his eyes interpreting his words. But Charlie evidently did not understand him.

"You mean in the way of investment, sir?"

"Yes," said the Reverend Gordon Laird; "yes, I guess that's it--yes, investment."

This somewhat enigmatical conversation was terminated by the advent of the other members of the family, all quite ready for the supper that was waiting. And a decidedly animated circle it was that surrounded our well-laden board. Uncle was in fine spirits, as he ever was when he had congenial company, and the honours of his attention were pretty evenly divided between the Scotchman and the Southerner.

It was delightful to watch the interest and surprise of our clerical guest, so new and different did everything appear to him. For our dear Southland has fashions all its own, each one of them more delicious than another. Perhaps this is especially true of what we eat, and of how we go about it. We had a coloured boy with a long feather fan whose duty it was to guard us from the flies. This amused him vastly; especially once when my aunt motioned him to look--the dusky Washington was almost asleep, leaning against the wall. And so many of our dishes seemed to strike the foreigner as the newest and most palatable things on earth. We had the savoury rock in little fish-shaped dishes--they looked all ready to swim--and sweet potatoes and corn bread and fried chicken, and hot biscuits too, and a lot of other things Scotchmen never see. It was lovely to watch Aunt Agnes' face, brightening with every recurring exclamation of surprise or pleasure from our visitor.

On the other hand he was hardly less interesting to us. A really new type is something to which a little Southern town is seldom treated--we are so fearfully native-born. And Gordon Laird (the Reverend can't be always used) seemed to bring with him the flavour of the world without. His accent was so different, as I have said; and many of his terms were so unfamiliar to us. For instance, we soon remarked that he referred to the Episcopal church as the Church of England; and once or twice he spoke of the "Kirk Session," which had to be explained; and he rarely used the term "pastor," or "preacher," as we did--it was always "minister" with him. It was most interesting, too, to hear him talk of Edinburgh, of its castle, its Holyrood, its Princes Street, its Scott's monument, its haunts of Knox and memories of Burns.

"Fo' de Lawd, Miss Helen, dat new preacher, he's got a heap o' learnin'," Lyddie said one day, "an' he knows how to let it out, dat's sho'."

That very first night, that first supper, I mean, found us all listening with great intentness to his description of much we had hardly ever heard of before. I remember he spoke of higher criticism, giving the names of two or three great Scottish scholars, and he seemed a little disappointed to find we had never heard of the latter and but little more than heard of the former. He spoke, it seemed to me, as if this higher criticism were a matter of great importance, almost as if it were troubling his own soul--but this I did not understand till long after.

The discussion ran so steadily along church lines that even Charlie, who was not very strong on matters ecclesiastical, contributed a question.

"What church does your Queen belong to, Mr. Laird?" he asked.

"To the Presbyterian," replied our guest, looking very candidly at the questioner; "when she is in Scotland, that is."

"Oh," said Charlie, "I always thought she belonged to the State church."

"So she does," replied the other, "and that is the State church of Scotland."

"Miss Helen thinks that's fine," broke in my uncle. "I'm sure her far-off ancestors must have been Scotch Presbyterians, Mr. Laird. She's a regular Puritan--in theory."

"Then you'll be going to the service at the opening of Presbytery to-night, Miss Randall," said Mr. Laird, turning to me.

I was silent, not knowing just what to say. Yet I felt that uncle's statement was quite just all the time. For, ever since a child, I had had a kind of passionate devotion to the church of my fathers; yet it is only fair to add that if there was one girl in all our town who would not have been called religious, who would, in fact, have been called a gay society girl--what a poor garish definition that seems to me now!--I was that very one.

"What her uncle says about Helen reminds me of something I must tell you, Mr. Laird," began my mother, breaking the silence that had followed his rather pointed question. "I always taught her the Shorter Catechism when she was a little girl--made her learn it, at least--and one Sunday afternoon I was following her around the yard trying to get her to answer what is Sanctification; well, she suddenly turned to me, and what do you think she said?"

"Couldn't imagine, I'm sure," answered Mr. Laird.

"'What's the use, mother,' she said, 'of teaching me all this--when perhaps I won't marry a Presbyterian at all?'"

"All the more need of it then," replied our guest amid the laugh that followed; "it won't be wasted anyhow, whoever the lucky man may be. It's wonderful how that catechism stays with you, when once it gets in the blood. I learned it on the hills of Scotland," he went on, his deep eyes brightening as if the memory gave him joy, "and I hardly ever wander now in wild or lonely regions without its great words coming back to me. They go well together, I always think--they're both lofty."

"On the hills?" echoed Mr. Giddens, who had never lived outside the city; "did your father send you there to learn it?--pretty hard lines, I should say."

"Oh, no," Mr. Laird answered simply, "my work lay there. I used to take care of sheep on the hills--I was a herd laddie, as they call them in Scotland. My father is a shepherd."

I felt, rather than saw, the consternation that came on every face.

"What did you say about your father?" my uncle asked involuntarily, looking up impulsively from his plate. Now, uncle was a gentleman, if ever one was born, but this intimation fairly swept him off his feet. "You were speaking about your father, were you not?" he amended, thinking the question more delicate in this form.

"Yes," said Mr. Laird, evidently quite unconscious of having caused a sensation. "I was saying my father is a shepherd. He takes care, along with other herds, of the gentlemen's flocks in Scotland--in Midlothian. The shepherd gets so many sheep for himself each year--that's part of his hire, you see."

"Yes, yes, I see," rejoined my uncle. "Have some more of the ice-cream, Mr. Laird. Washington, pass the ice-cream to the gentleman." It was funny, had it not been so real, to see uncle's consternation. This was something new to my patrician relative.

"Do let me help you to a little more of this chocolate cake," broke in my aunt.

"And your coffee cup is empty," added my mother. Both showed the sudden perturbation that had laid hold of uncle, for which the only outlet was this sudden freshet of hospitality.

"No, thank you," our guest answered quietly, "I've had quite enough--you Southerners would soon kill a man with kindness. Yes," he went on, resuming the interrupted theme, "the catechism goes well with the shepherd's crook; if there's any one calling in the world that's been productive of plain living and high thinking, it's the shepherd's."

"Half of that programme appeals to me," laughed Charlie Giddens, helping himself generously to the chocolate cake. "I'm afraid I'd make a poor shepherd." Charlie seemed unable to keep his eyes from Mr. Laird's face; this candour of biography was quite beyond him.

"But it's a fact," our Scotch visitor went on quite earnestly; "it's wonderful the difference there has been, as a class, between the shepherds and the ploughmen, in Scotland. The shepherds have been so much superior; their eyes were constantly lifted to the hills, you see, and the others had to keep theirs on the ground. Besides, their work developed a sense of responsibility--and it took a tender man to make a good shepherd. Oh, yes, the shepherds of Scotland have been a noble race of men."

"And your father is still living in Scotland?" enquired my mother from across the table.

"Yes," he answered; "yes, he's still living."

"That's a phase of life we haven't been privileged to see," my uncle remarked, concluding quite a lengthy silence; "indeed, we haven't seen anything of your Scottish life at all. I have often thought I'd love especially to see Edinburgh."

"I'd sooner see the shepherds on the hills," cried I. "I'd love to see the heather--and the mists rolling back over the mountains, like I've read about in Scott."

"Have you never been to the old world, Miss Helen?" our guest enquired of me.

"No, never," I replied; "I've never been from under the stars and stripes."

"But she's contemplating a European trip, Mr. Laird," Mr. Giddens broke in, looking very knowingly at me.

"Yes," chimed my mother, a playful smile lurking about her mouth, "perhaps you'll meet over there before very long."

Mr. Laird turned and looked at me. I know my face betrayed me. But if he put two and two together he didn't give us the result. "I hope you'll bring your mother with you when you come," was all he said.

"But Mrs. Randall's a poor sailor," quoth Charlie Giddens.

"So am I," was my remark.

"Then you must choose a fair-weather season for your voyage," pressed Charlie, maintaining an excellent gravity.

"But you can't always tell," said I. "Often the storms don't come till you get out to sea."