“I gied him in a present to his faither,” said the fisherman, lifting the little wet obstreperous Sandy upon his shoulders, “and Saunders took him as quiet as that cuddie taks the thrissles—so a’ the splore’s dune, Jean, and I maun awa into the toun wi’ the flounders; whaur’s the creels?”
“Mr Oswald,” said Saunders Delvie solemnly, looking in at the door of the banker’s private room, as he passed the bank on his way home. “I hae gotten back my son; he was dead and is alive again—he was lost and is found—and I’ve come to offer ye my thanks, Sir, for your guid counsel. The Lord sent grief sae lang as I called His name to witness my wrath against the lad, but now, when I hae learned better, behold the mercy! I’m thankfu’ to you, Maister Oswald—I’m an auld man, but I needed to learn—and I’m thankfu’ aboon a’ to Him that pat words o’ guid counsel into your mouth, and garred my heart change—for now I’m taking Peter hame.”
The banker fell back in his chair as Saunders withdrew, looking and feeling very much disconcerted; for he had offered no good counsel—had given no advice. The thanks which he did not deserve fell on him with the strength of just reproof. The pen fell from his fingers—the solemn joy and thanksgiving of the stern old peasant moved him almost as much as his grief had done. It touched the conscience of the obdurate father of William Oswald.
“And was you killed at the same place as the gentleman, Peter, my man?” said Peter’s mother, wiping her eyes, as the first excitement of their meeting subsided. The cottage too was in very solemn order, and the house-mother had put on her Sabbath gown. There was a grave significance in these changes.
“Na—I got my wound at anither place, mother,” said Peter, “and they pat me in the hospital. It was just when I came out that I heard o’ the gentlemen—that they were gaun hame; sae I gaed to Mr Murray—I minded hearing aboot him being lost lang ago—and tellt him my story, and he engaged me to be his servant. His servant, mother; but I think he paid mair attention to me on the road hame than I could do to him, and said he would speak to my faither. I wish—I just wish there was onything in the world the like o’ me could do—no like to make it up to him, but just to let him see that ane was thankful; but I’m come hame a puir useless object, mother; they say I’ll be lame a’ my days.”
Poor Peter began to look disconsolate again. The idea of being a burden on those for whom he would so gladly have laboured, was very bitter to him.
“Dinna, laddie, dinna,” said Saunders Delvie. “I’m strong and hale, the Lord be thanked, though I’m auld; do ye think I winna work for ye baith as blythe, ay, as blythe as the day ye were born—as blythe as I gaed out to my wark, Marget, the first time I heard the bairn greet in this house, and kent the blessing was come? Maistly blyther, woman, for I didna ken the depths then as I do now. What for do ye greet? I tell ye it behoves us to gie the Lord thanks, and no’ tears, for His mercy.”
But the tears were the thanks; they hung upon Saunders’s own withered cheek as he reproved his wife.
“Nae doubt but we’ll fend,” said the mother, “nae doubt but we’ll be provided for. Wha ever wanted yet that put trust where it should be put? But gang away, Saunders, like a man, and put on your ilka day’s claes; I canna help it—it comes into my head ye’ve been at a funeral when I look at ye, and the like o’ thae thochts are no’ for this day.”
And in this cottage and in Mossgray the joy of reünion was the same, only perhaps so much the greater here, as the passionate spirit of this old man was more intense and vehement than any other near him, greater alike in its joys and sorrows.