“Whisht, callant,” said Lauderdale, whose amusement was momentary; “if I had ever come to onything in this world, and had a kirk, I wouldna have been so fanciful. It’s well for you to get your lesson written out so plain. There’s nae place to speak of here for the prayers and the thanksgivings. I’m no saying but what they are the best, but that’s no our manner of regarding things in Scotland. Even the man that has maist set his heart on a revolution must aye begin with things as they are. This is no a place open at a’ times to every man that has a word to say to God in quietness, like yon Catholic chapels. It’s a place for preaching; and you maun preach.”
“Preach!” said Colin; “what am I to preach? What I have learned here and there, in Dickopftenburg for example, or in the Divinity Hall? and much the better they would be for all that. Besides, I don’t believe in preaching, Lauderdale. Preaching never did me the least service. As for that beastly pulpit perched up there, all wood and noise as it is——” but here Colin paused, overcome by the weight of his discontent, and the giddiness natural to his terrible fall.
“Well,” said Lauderdale, after a pause, “I’m no saying but what there’s some justice in what you say; but I would like to hear, with your ideas, what you’re meaning to do.”
To which Colin answered with a groan. “Preach,” he said gloomily; “there is nothing else I can do: preach them to death, I suppose: preach about everything in heaven and earth; it is all a priest is good for here.”
“Ay,” said Lauderdale; “and then the worst o’t is that you’re no a priest, but only a minister. I wouldna say, however, but what you might pluck up a heart and go into the singing business, and maybe have a process in the presbytery about an organ; that’s the form that reformation takes in our kirk, especially with young ministers that have travelled and cultivated their minds, like you. But, Colin,” said the philosopher, “you’ve been in more places than the Divinity Hall. There was once a time when you were awfu’ near dying, if a man daur say the truth now it’s past; and there was once a bit little cham’er out yonder, between heaven and earth——”
Out yonder—Lauderdale gave a little jerk with his hand, as he stood at the open door, across the grey, level country which lay between the parish church of Afton and the sea; and the words and the gesture conveyed Colin suddenly to the lighted window that shone feebly over the Campagna, and to the talk within over Meredith’s deathbed. The recollection brought a wonderful change over his thoughts. He took his friend’s arm in silence, when he had locked the door. “I wonder what he is doing,” said Colin. “I wonder whether the reality has fallen short of the expectation there. If there should be no golden gates or shining streets as yet, but only another kind of life with other hopes and trials! If one could but know!”
“Ay,” said Lauderdale, in the tone that Colin knew so well; and then there was a long pause. “I’m no saying but what it’s natural,” he went on afterwards with some vagueness. “It’s aye awfu’ hard upon a man to get his ain way; but once in a while there’s one arises that can take the good out of even that. You’ll no make Scotland of your way of thinking, Colin; but you’ll make it worth her while to have brought ye forth for a’ that. As for Arthur, poor callant, I wouldna say but his ideal may have changed a wee on the road there. I’m awfu’ indifferent to the shining streets for my part; but I’m no indifferent to them that bide yonder in the silence. There was one now that wasna in your case,” continued Lauderdale; “he was aye pleased to teach in season and out of season. For the sake of the like of him, I’m whiles moved to hope that a’s no so awfu’ perfect in the other world as we think. I canna see ony ground for it in the Bible. Naething ever comes to an end in this world, callant;—and that was just what I was meaning to ask in respect to other things.”
“I don’t know what you mean by other things,” said Colin; “that is, if you mean Miss Meredith, Lauderdale, I have heard nothing of her for years. That must be concluded to have come to an end if anything ever did. It is not for me to subject myself to rejection any more.”
Upon which Lauderdale breathed out a long breath which sounded like a sigh, and was visible as well as audible in the frosty air. “It’s aye weel to have your lesson written so plain,” he said after a minute, with that want of apparent sequence which was sometimes amusing and sometimes irritating to Colin; “it’s nae disgrace to a man to do his work under strange conditions. When a lad like you has no place to work in but a pulpit, it’s clear to me that God intends him to preach whether he likes it or no.”
And this was all the comfort Colin received, in the midst of his disenchantment and discouragement, from his dearest friend.