“I must speak to the laird,” he said. “I doubt if he will accept your offer.”
“As he pleases. But I do not promise to let the offer stand. I make it now—not to-morrow, or an hour hence.”
“I must run the risk,” answered Cosmo. “Will you allow me to jump the gate?”
But his lordship had a key, and preferred opening it.
When Cosmo reached his father’s room, he found him not yet thinking of getting up, and sat down and told him all—to what straits they were reduced; what Grizzie had felt herself compelled to do in his illness; how his mind and heart and conscience had been exercised concerning the castle; how all his life, for so it seemed now, the love of it had held him to the dust; where and on what errand he had been that morning, with the result of his interview with Lord Lick-my-loof. He had fought hard, he said, and through the grace of God had overcome his weakness—so far at least that it should no more influence his action; but now he could go no further without his father. He was equal to no more.
“I would not willingly be left out of your troubles, my son,” said the old man, cheerfully. “Leave me alone a little. There is one, you know, who is nearer to each of us than we are to each other: I must talk to him—your father and my father, in whom you and I are brothers.”
Cosmo bowed in reverence, and withdrew.
After the space of nearly half an hour, he heard the signal with which his father was in the habit of calling him, and hastened to him.
The laird held out his old hand to him.
“Come, my son,” he said, “and let us talk together as two of the heirs of all things. It’s unco easy for me to regaird wi’ equanimity the loss o’ a place I am on the point o’ leavin’ for the hame o’ a’ hames—the dwellin’ o’ a’ the loves, withoot the dim memory or foresicht o’ which—I’m thinkin’ they maun be aboot the same thing—we could never hae lo’ed this auld place as we du, an’ whaur, ance I’m in, a’ thing doon here maun dwindle ootworthied by reason o’ the glory that excelleth—I dinna mean the glory o’ pearls an’ gowd, or even o’ licht, but the glory o’ love an’ trowth. But gien I’ve ever had onything to ca’ an ambition, Cosmo, it has been that my son should be ane o’ the wise, wi’ faith to believe what his father had learned afore him, an’ sae start farther on upo’ the narrow way than his father had startit. My ambition has been that my endeavours and my experience should in such measure avail for my boy, as that he should begin to make his own endeavours and gather his own experience a little nearer that perfection o’ life efer which oor divine nature groans an’ cries, even while unable to know what it wants. Blessed be the voice that tells us we maun forsake all, and take up our cross, and follow him, losing our life that we may find it! For whaur wad he hae us follow him but til his ain hame, to the verra bosom o’ his God an’ oor God, there to be ane wi’ the Love essential!”