The books were carried level with the top button of John's waistcoat—the Psalm-book being held in its place by the two extended thumbs—and neither were allowed to depart from the absolute horizontal by an eighth of an inch, even going up the pulpit stairs. When they had been deposited in their place, and slightly patted, just to settle them, John descended to make way for the Doctor, who had been waiting beneath in a commanding attitude. He then followed the minister up, and closed the door—not with a bang, but yet so that all might know he had finished his part of the work. If any one had doubted how much skill went to this achievement, he had his eyes opened when John had the lumbago, and the smith arrived at the kirk door three yards ahead of the Doctor, and let the Psalm-book fall on the pulpit floor.
"We 're thankfu' tae hae ye back, John," said Hillocks. "Yon wes a temptin' o' Providence."
Once only had I the privilege of seeing John in this his glory, and the sight of him afflicted me with a problem no one has ever solved. It might, indeed, be made a branch of scientific investigation, and would then be called the Genesis of Beadles. Was a beadle ever a baby? What like was he before he appeared in his office? Was he lying as a cardinal in petto till the right moment, and then simply showed himself to be appointed as one born unto this end? No one dared to hint that John had ever followed any other avocation, and an effort to connect John with the honourable trade of plumbing in the far past was justly regarded as a disgraceful return of Tammie Ronaldson's for much faithful dealing. Drumtochty refused to consider his previous history, if he had any, and looked on John in his office as a kind of Melchizedek, a mysterious, isolated work of Providence.
He was a mere wisp of a man, with a hard, keen face, iron-grey hair brushed low across his forehead, and clean-shaven cheeks.
He was a mere wisp of a man.
"A 've naething tae say against a beard," on being once consulted, "an' a 'm no prepared tae deny it maun be in the plan o' Providence. In fact, gin a' wes in a private capaucity, a' michtna shave, but in ma public capaucity, a 've nae alternative. It wud be a fine story tae gang roond the Presbytery o' Muirtown that the Beadle o' Drumtochty hed a beard."
His authority was supreme under the Doctor, and never was disputed by man or beast save once, and John himself admitted that the circumstances were quite peculiar. It was during the Doctor's famous continental tour, when Drumsheugh fought with strange names in the kirkyard, and the Presbytery supplied Drumtochty in turn. The minister of St. David's, Muirtown, was so spiritual that he left his voice at the foot of the pulpit stairs, and lived in the Song of Solomon, with occasional excursions into the Lamentations of Jeremiah, and it was thoughtless not to have told Mr. Curlew that two or three dogs—of unexceptionable manners—attended our kirk with their masters. They would no more have thought of brawling in church than John himself, and they knew the parts of the service as well as the Doctor, but dogs have been so made by our common Creator that they cannot abide falsetto, and Mr. Curlew tried them beyond endurance. When he lifted up his voice in "Return, return, O Shulamite, return, return," a long wail in reply, from below a back seat where a shepherd was slumbering, proclaimed that his appeal had not altogether failed. "Put out that dog," said the preacher in a very natural voice, with a strong suggestion of bad temper, "put that dog out immediately; it's most disgraceful that such… eh, conduct should go, on in a Christian church. Where is the church officer?"
"A'm the Beadle o' Drumtochty"—standing in his place—"an' a'll dae yir pleesure;" and the occasion was too awful for any one, even the dog's master, to assist, far less to laugh.