CHAPTER XXII.
[IN SESSION].
The joint meeting of elders and deacons broke up as described, and left the minister alone. They did not separate, however, for Ebenezer Prittie stood without the cottage door, and begged them so urgently to come round to the Post Office that they consented.
The Post Office proved a meeting place still more restricted than the one they had left, but it was private. The shop having been closed, they seated themselves on the counter and sundry kegs of nails, and waited the opening of the proceedings.
Ebenezer moved that Mr. Sangster should take the chair (a tall slender-legged stool), and that the proceedings should be minuted in the Session books, as a continuance after adjournment of the meeting which had just broken up. Mr. Sangster objected to so irregular a course, and declined to mount the chair. He would be happy to hold an informal conversation with his friends there assembled, but he would take no part in a hole-and-corner meeting not duly called, and held without the knowledge of their minister, who of right should preside.
Ebenezer coughed behind his hand, cleared his voice, and stood forth. He had been planning something very energetic in the way of resolutions and minutes of Session, which by and by would be produced in the Presbytery with his name as prime mover and leader; but now he had got them together, it did not appear such plain sailing as he had anticipated, and he began to have qualms and misgivings. The position of prosecutor or accuser did not appear so desirous, now that he stood in the midst of that silent and expectant circle, as it had done when he was merely planning it. He coughed again, but the silence remained unbroken. No one else desired to speak, so he had to go on. He told them that it was unnecessary for him to name the reason for his having requested them to reassemble there, as they knew it already. Mr. Sangster interrupted, that he for one had not an idea of the object of their meeting, and was waiting to hear it. Ebenezer replied that the whole glen was ringing with reports of the evil living of the person acting as pastor over them,--that it was a crying scandal, and that the enemy would have good cause to exult over the subversion of their Zion, if they did not cast the unclean thing out from among them.'
'What do you allude to. Mr. Prittie?' asked Mr. Sangster.
'To the minister's bairn, sir!' replied Ebenezer; 'ye hardly need to speer that.'
'But Mr. Brown's adoption of a foundling infant affords no ground of censure that I can see. I confess, indeed, that I have always thought he had set us an example of Christian charity we would do well to copy.'
'Do ye mean to say, sir, ye dinna ken wha's acht that bairn?'
'I do. Whose is it?'
'His ain, of course!'
'How do you know?'
'A' body kens that by noo, 'at bides in Glen Effick.'
'I don't, for one; and I should like to know how you know it.'
'What a' body says maun be true! Ye'll allow that, Mester Sangster. An' what's mair, the mither's kenned as weel.'
'And who is the mother? Has she said so?'
'A body wadna just look for that, ye ken, sir. Folk dizna cry stinkin' fish e'y open market. An' ye wadna be lookin' to hear auld Tibbie Tirpie cryin' 'cuttie' after her ain dochter!'
'How then do you make it out? For myself, I don't believe one word of it.'
'Do ye mean to say 'at I'm leein', Mester Sangster? I'm but a puir man to you, I ken weel; an' I'm mindin' 'at ye're the Laird of Auchlippie; but I was ordeened to the eldership o' the kirk the same day ye was yoursel', an' I'm thinkin' we're baith brithers in the house o' God, whaur there's no respect of persons; an' I kenna what for ye suld think I'm leein' ony mair nor yersel'.'
'Whisht, man!' remonstrated Peter Malloch. 'The Laird never thocht to misdoubt you. It's just a way o' speakin' folk's gotten. But I'm sayin', Mester Sangster, I cud gang a lang gate mysel' e'y pruivin' o' thae suspeecions. I hae seen the minister wi' my ain een, slinkin' frae the auld wife's door, lang efter dark; an' the verra next day, doon she comes to me for tea an' sneeshin' an' sic like trokes as a puir body can do wantin' weel eneugh, an' pays a' wi' a pund note o' the Peterhead Bank. There's nae misdoubtin' whaur that siller cam frae! An' folk dinna gie notes to puir bodies for naething.'
'Folk differ in that as in other things, Peter,' retorted the laird with a shrug. 'Some wad gie a bodle gin they had ane, an' when they haena they gie a bawbee. An' mony's the button I hae fand in the kirk collections in my time! But I can't see that therefore we must attribute Mr. Brown's liberality to an evil motive. He preaches liberal giving, you know, and he practises what he preaches. Perhaps we might all take a lesson from him and increase our charities without going beyond our duty.'
'Hech!' sighed a voice in the corner, 'it's no the amount! It's the speerit it's dune in; an' that's a grand truith, an' a comfortin'. It was the Widdie's twa mites 'at gat a' the praise!'
'Yes!' retorted the Laird with a chuckle, 'but they were all her living! The chield that put the button in the plate gets little countenance there! But, to return to the rumours; there would have to be some more conclusive evidence before any step could be taken in the matter. As I have said before, I believe the whole thing is just idle talk, and I will be no party to insulting Mr. Brown by even bringing such an insinuation under his notice. This parish and the whole church owe him gratitude for his zealous and self-denying labours. I regard the whole tenor of his life among us as ample refutation of any unsubstantiated report that can be circulated to his disparagement; and I wonder that any office-bearer of this church, after all the intercourse we have been privileged to have with him, can think otherwise. I think it is the duty of all here present, to put down this tattling of idle tongues; and if we cannot stop, at least we should not heed them, and by-and-by they will cease to wag of themselves.'
'It's braw crackin' about tatlin' tongues,' said Peter Malloch, 'but wadna we be giein' the enemy grund to blaspheme? an' that's clean contrar' to Scripter. A bonny tale the reseeduaries wad mak o't a', gin it cam to their lugs! They're aye sayin', as it is, 'at the unco gude (an' that means hiz) are nae better nor ither folk, but a hantle waur. An' as for Mester Brown an' his giein', there's mair ways o' doin' gude nor juist giein siller to feckless bodies 'at canna help themsels. What for canna hie gie a help to the honest hard workin' folk 'at's fechtin' their best to gar baith ends meet, an' support the lawfu' tred o' his ain glen? "Claw me an' I'se claw ye," is gude plen Scotch. Gin folk peys their pennies intil the Sustentation Fund reglar, it's gey an yerksom to see the minister's family gae by the door, an' dale wi' outsiders. It'll be a week come the morn 'at the carrier frae Inverlyon brocht them a muckle creel fu' o' groceries. What wad come to the tred o' the glen gin a' body dealt that gate?'
'Hoot, Peter,' snorted the Laird, 'the sand in yer sugar's been ower grit! I'm thinkin' I heard tell o' a sma' chuckie stane in Miss Brown's tea-cup. Folk are na juist hens, ye see, an' dinna find sic provender halesome.'
Something like a snigger followed the Laird's sally. No one else present being a 'merchant' of eatables, the joke was greatly relished. It is always pleasant to see a neighbour suffer, because it gives point and relish to one's own immunity. It is a form of childish sensuality that survives the relish for lollipops, but it is perhaps most openly indulged in during the lollipop period. Whispering and restlessness become hushed all over the school-room when a whipping is going forward. Each child settles in its seat to watch the performance, all eyes and interest; the sharper the whish of the cane and the louder the wail of the victim, the more pleasurable and keen the interest of each spectator, for the better he realizes the ease and comfort of his own little skin.
Peter flushed. The laird was a privileged man, who might take his joke as he pleased, but no prescriptive immunity sheltered the rest.
'I see naething to nicker at, Ebenezer Prittie! Gin onything fell amang my sugar I ken naething about it ava, as I'll explain to Miss Brown; but I see na hoo yer ain ellwand can be an inch shorter nor ither folks, an' ye no ken o't.'
'I daur ye to say that again, ye ill-faured leein' rascal! Gin it war na for my godly walk and conversation, as a Christian man an' an Elder, I'd lay the ellwand about yer crappet lugs!'
Here there was a general intervention between the two angry men, and the laird expressed his regret at having used any expression that could disturb the harmony of the meeting, but they knew his weakness for a joke; and as everything seemed to have been said on the subject they had met to consider, and as it was getting late, he would now wish them all good-night.
'I see na that a' has been said,' observed Ebenezer, so soon as the Laird was beyond hearing, 'or that ony thing has been said ava that's ony gude. Are we to let the hale thing drap, an' mak fules o' oursel's afore the hale glen, just to pleasure Auchlippie? I trow no!'
'An' what wad ye be for doin' then?' asked one.
'I'll tell ye what we suld do,' suggested another. 'Isna Mester Dowlas comin' to haud the meetin,' an' lay the fundation o' the new Kirk? An' what for suldna we ca' him to adveese wi' us what ocht to be dune? I'm thinkin' he's as weel able as Auchlippie to direc' folk, an' we needna be feared to anger him, he's no a laird.'
'Aweel!' said Ebenezer, who had now mounted on the top of the tall stool, and was benevolently regarding the meeting from his self-appointed station as chairman. 'Ye'll better juist muive that, Andra Semple, an' as I'm e'y chair I'll put yer motion to the meetin'. An' syne ye can muive an adjournment, Elluck Lamont, an' we'll adjourn to Thursday efternoon, whan the kirk skells. An' sae we'll be a' in order ('let a'thing be dune decently an' in order,' says the Apostle) till we get Mester Dowlas to set us richt.'
Thus the meeting had but small direct result. Its effect indirectly, however, was considerable. When, early that evening, the members had stolen down the lane near the minister's cottage, to intercept each other and feel circuitously towards the point of interest, each would have been ashamed, first and unsupported, to repeat aloud the rumours that had reached him. When he had heard them in the first instance, usually from his wife--it is the gentle sex usually which originates or introduces such tales, probably because it has no head to break, which is to say, that its corporal immunities in a civilized land enable it to say unpunished what would bring down on the male tattler both brawls and broken bones,--he had at first declared it was impossible, and then that it was unlikely; and even when, after dwelling on it in his mind, the love of a sensation made him half think half hope there might be something in it, he would hesitate to allude to it save by a whisper and a shake of the head, and would caution his wife not to repeat it, or let herself appear as one who was giving it currency. When, however, the matter had been talked over, audible speech exercised its usual defining and contracting influence. The mysterious and appalling, as well as the doubtful element, became vulgarised as well as realized. Without any additional evidence, yet in the company of so many others who all believed, each felt it due to his own character for clear-sightedness and high moral tone to dismiss every remnant of doubt, and to be eager for the exposure and punishment of the offender. Afterwards, in the presence of the accused himself, their certainty had begun a little to waver. The many pieties and goodnesses associated with him in their memories, were too discordant with this new and vulgar suspicion, and probably had they met him each alone, they would have dismissed the accusation from their minds; but each sat under the scrutinizing eyes of his twelve or thirteen fellows. They were the eyes into which he had looked, a little while ago, when he had made up his mind that the rumours were well founded; and as he felt their glance on him now, it was like a voice urging steadfastness and consistency with what he had been saying so shortly before. Those persons looking at him had heard him say that he believed everything; how, then, could he, while still under their eye, turn round and dismiss his suspicions without any new fact or argument to account for the change? Nevertheless, the zeal of the old Hebrew prophets, which some of them had felt stirring in their veins and urging them to lift a testimony and denounce the sinner in the midst of his ways, had cooled and oozed away as they sat round the sickbed; each looked expectantly to the others, but felt he could not undertake the work himself. It was a relief to all of them to leave the sick-room, and when they re-assembled at the Post Office, they felt more strongly built up in their suspicions than ever. If anything could have bound them more firmly to their position, it was Mr. Sangster's scant respect for the conclusion at which they had arrived. They were willing to admit his superiority both in position and education, and probably any one of them would have deferred to him if alone; but the sturdy democratic or Presbyterian element in them objected to so many yielding to the one who wore a better coat and had learned Latin; and when in the end he tried to dismiss the meeting, after pooh-poohing its object as absurd, they felt bound to assert themselves by boldly and openly taking the other course.
All reserve, therefore, was dropped. Each had all the others to bear him out in whatever he said; and that night he openly discussed the supposed facts with his wife while she prepared his supper.
The next morning the 'stoups' stood empty at the well, and heaps of wet linen lay neglected and unspread down on the 'loaning,' while their owners in garrulous knots discussed the minister's misdoings, and Peter Malloch sold more little parcels of tea and snuff than he had ever done in one day before, so many of the gudewives desired to get his version with full particulars.