His son strode to his side, and laid his arm over his shoulders.
'So do I, father,' he returned; 'but it is because I have got you.'
The old man turned and looked at him with a tenderness I had never seen on his face before. As soon as I saw that, I no longer doubted that he could be saved.
We found rooms in a farm-house on the topmost height.
'These are poor little hills, Falconer,' I said. 'Yet they help one like mountains.'
'The whole question is,' he returned, 'whether they are high enough to lift you out of the dirt. Here we are in the airs of heaven—that is all we need.'
'They make me think how often, amongst the country people of Scotland, I have wondered at the clay-feet upon which a golden head of wisdom stood! What poor needs, what humble aims, what a narrow basement generally, was sufficient to support the statues of pure-eyed Faith and white-handed Hope.'
'Yes,' said Falconer: 'he who is faithful over a few things is a lord of cities. It does not matter whether you preach in Westminster Abbey, or teach a ragged class, so you be faithful. The faithfulness is all.'
After an early dinner we went out for a walk, but we did not go far before we sat down upon the grass. Falconer laid himself at full length and gazed upwards.
'When I look like this into the blue sky,' he said, after a moment's silence, 'it seems so deep, so peaceful, so full of a mysterious tenderness, that I could lie for centuries, and wait for the dawning of the face of God out of the awful loving-kindness.'