Gordon's face was very grave as he began to tell me of the only opening he saw before him.
"But you'll get another call, Gordon—and another church, won't you?" I asked, dimly fearing.
"No, no other call—and no other church," he answered firmly; "at least, no regular church, Helen;" with which he explained to me how the very reasons that prompted him to renounce St. Andrew's must hold him back from any similar position. "But I'll have a field of work just the same—of usefulness, too, please God," he added, in the lowest voice. "I can labour there without being responsible to any one but Him."
Then he told me all about the plan he had in view. He would take the little mission in Swan Hollow; this was the sunken part of the city in which he had so long carried on the work that had received so much of his care and love—the same to which Jennie McMillan had belonged, to whom I owed the happiness of all the years between.
"We've got a little church there," he said, a note of pride mingling with the sadness of his voice, "and it doesn't belong to anybody but ourselves. The people built it—and I helped them. It's just possible the Presbytery may try to interfere with me—but I don't think so. That's where I'm going to preach now, Helen; and I'll preach the truth as I believe it."
"But, Gordon," I remonstrated, "won't it be the same truth that you've preached in St. Andrew's?"
He did not answer immediately. And his face was clouded when his words came at length. "It won't be the same as St. Andrew's expects to hear—and wants to hear," he said; "they demand the old orthodox truths in the old orthodox way—and then they're through with them," he added a little bitterly; "till the next Sunday, at least."
"But aren't those the same truths your father believes?" I pressed, feeling the strength of my reply.
"Yes," he answered, "but my father believes them in his inmost heart—and he lives them."
"And don't you believe them in your inmost heart, Gordon?" I cried eagerly—"the way your father does?"