"Alas! God Christ—along the weary lands,
What lone invisible Calvaries are set,
What drooping brows with dews of anguish wet,
What faint outspreading of unwilling hands,
Bound to a viewless cross with viewless bands.
While at the darkest hour what ghosts are met
Of ancient pain and bitter fond regret,
Till the new-risen spirit understands."
Doctor Macrae left London immediately after this interview, but he did not at once return to Glasgow. He spent two days at Oxford and nearly a week in the manufacturing towns of Yorkshire, the rest of his leisure in the historic city of Newcastle. He was interested in what he saw, but not comforted by it. For he was well aware that all his hopes had been stripped to the nakedness of a dream. The week days trailed on the ground and the Sabbaths made no effort to rise to the height of their birth. For the spiritual center of his being had never yet been in touch with the spiritual center in the universe, and all philosophies and all creeds must come back to this sympathetic understanding between the Comforter and the Comforted, or they come to nothing.
Many years ago he had analyzed prayer by his creed, and felt that it had nothing to do with troubles so personal and selfish as his love or his hatred. For some wise purpose this discipline of wasted love had been given him, and his duty was to bear his loss as manfully as he could. There had once been a time when he would even have rejoiced to give up any personal happiness if he thought that by doing so he was learning a God-sent lesson. He could not do that now. He had been too long looking into the Deity instead of looking up to Him. He had compelled himself to question and to qualify until he knew not how to believe nor yet what to believe. Poor soul! He thought prayer could be reasoned about! Prayer, which is an unrevealed transaction, beyond the region of the stars!
At length, the time of his absence from duty being completed, he took a train for Glasgow, arriving there early in the evening. It was raining hard, it was dark, and the points of gas light only rendered the darkness visible. The streets were crowded with men and women in dripping coats, jostling each other with dripping umbrellas as they hurried home after their day's work.
In the quiet space of Bath Street the driver of his cab dropped his whip and stopped in order to regain it; and in those moments Dr. Macrae noticed a wretched looking man trying to get a few pennies by singing "The Land of Our Birth." His voice was full of pain and tears, and Macrae called him and put a shilling in his hand. The beggar's look of amazement and gratitude was wonderful. He raised the coin as he took it, and cried out, "O God!" and the look and the words fell on Macrae's heart like a soft shower on a parched land. They called up one of those tender smiles quite possible, and even natural, to his face, though far too seldom seen there. In the light of this smile he reached his home, and the next moment the door opened and Marion and Mrs. Caird stood waiting with outstretched hands to greet him.
He fell readily into their happy mood, and sat down between them to the excellent tea waiting for him. And the blessing of the shilling was on him, and he talked cheerfully of all that he had seen, but added as he took his large easy-chair on the hearthrug,
"East or West, Home is Best."
Alas! this blessed mood did not last. In a few days he was again brooding in a hell of his own making. He could not rest his heart on any affection. Lady Cramer had deceived him, Donald had deserted him, Marion was restlessly waiting for her lover's return. Then she also would go. And Jessy Caird's heart was with Donald. He thought of these things until he felt himself to be a very lonely, desolate man; for the heart is like a vine, it withers and dies if it has nothing to embrace.
In a deep and overwhelming sense he knew that to obey or to disobey duty was to say "yes" or "no" to God, but what was his duty? He told himself that if he could only see the way of duty clear he would take it, however unpleasant or difficult it might be. Yes, he was sure of that. But what was his duty? He tried to find out by every logical method known to him, and every method pointed out some flaw in every other method.