The Prodigal Son

by Sir Hall Caine

A few irresistible pangs of regret, a few tears which he could not quite keep back, and then, feeling a certain satisfaction with himself, a certain pride in his self-sacrifice, Oscar went early to his work.

It was the autumn caravan time, when the farmers come with the last of the year's tallow and wool to have their accounts made up and settled. The offices and warehouses were like a market-place, and there was work for everybody. Oscar threw himself into the day's doings with astonishing energy, and when the Factor returned from breakfast he bantered him on his industry. "Better late than never, though," said the Factor, "and a good day in the autumn is worth two in the spring."

Oscar spent the morning in the office helping at the accounts. His part was to reconcile the farmers to their balances, for many of them were dissatisfied, and nearly all were in the Factor's debt. Some grumbled at the rate they received for their produce, others at the price they paid for foreign goods. Oscar's task was to persuade, cajole, and comfort them, and finally to draft the notes of hand on the bankers with which they discharged their debts. He felt mean and miserable.

Toward noon Helga sent a messenger to say that she hoped to rehearse some of the new music in the cathedral in the afternoon and to ask if Oscar would go with her. He answered that he could not, business was pressing, and he must stick to his work. It cost him a pang to send back this answer, but he had made his bed and he meant to lie on it.

He spent the afternoon in the warehouse, where the produce brought by the farmers was weighed and stacked away for the winter. The odor of the tallow and wool, mingling with the smell of the men's clothes and the reek of their bodies, made the atmosphere close and noisome, and to freshen the air Oscar ordered the big doors to be thrown open.

All at once through the clear, crisp winter air outside came the sound of the organ being played in the cathedral, and that was the last drop in his cup. It was like a voice calling him out of the lower world he lived in to the higher one he yearned for. It was like Helga beckoning to him in his unblessed surroundings, and through the roll of the music he could see her face.

For the first time Oscar was feeling bitterly about Thora, as if he were a prisoner and she were his jailer, when a man rode up to the warehouse door on a bright chestnut pony, with a line of pack ponies behind him. It was Magnus, and seeing him stand outside the counter, which he had formerly stood within, Oscar felt some qualms of shame, and called him into the scalesman's office.

The interview between the brothers was brief and commonplace, but every simple word seemed to throb and scorch like a flame. Oscar asked how Magnus was getting on at the farm, and if he had good servants, and Magnus answered "Yes"; he had always been fond of farming, and for servants he had only the old ones, and everything was as before. Oscar asked if the Governor had made satisfactory arrangements, and Magnus said he had, that the farm was his own now on terms of tenancy, and was to become his property at the old people's death.

"And how are you getting on here?" asked Magnus.

"I? Oh--pretty well, I think."