For an instant Lachlan hesitated, and then at the look on
Carmichael's face he held out both his hands.
"This iss a goot day for me, and I bid you ten thousand welcomes."
But the minister took the first word.
"You and I, Lachlan, have not seen eye to eye about some things lately, and I am not here to argue which is nearer the truth, because perhaps we may always differ on some lesser matters. But once I spoke rudely to you, and often I have spoken unwisely in my sermons. You are an old man and I am a young, and I ask you to forgive me and to pray that both of us may be kept near the heart of our Lord, whom we love, and who loves us."
No man can be so courteous as a Celt, and Lachlan was of the pure
Highland breed, kindest of friends, fiercest of foes.
"You hef done a beautiful deed this day, Maister Carmichael; and the grace of God must hef been exceeding abundant in your heart. It iss this man that asks your forgiveness, for I wass full of pride, and did not speak to you as an old man should; but God iss my witness that I would hef plucked out my right eye for your sake. You will say every word God gives you, and I will take as much as God gives me, and there will be a covenant between us as long as we live."
They knelt together on the earthen floor of that Highland cottage, the old school and the new, before one Lord, and the only difference in their prayers was that the young man prayed they might keep the faith once delivered unto the saints, while the burden of the old man's prayer was that they might be led into all truth.
Lachlan's portion that evening ought to have been the slaying of Sisera from the Book of Judges, but instead he read, to Flora's amazement—it was the night before she left her home—the thirteenth chapter of I Corinthians, and twice he repeated to himself, "Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face."