The Standard Bearer

CHAPTER XXVI

JEAN GEMMELL’S BARGAIN WITH GOD

Yet more grimly bitter than the day of December the thirtieth fell the night. I wandered by the bank of the river, where the sedges rustled lonely and dry by the marge, whispering and chuckling to each other that a forlorn, broken man was passing by. A “smurr” of rain had begun to fall at the hour of dusk, and the slight ice of the morning had long since broken up. The water lisped and sobbed as the wind of winter lapped at the ripples, and the peat-brew of the hills took its sluggish way to the sea.

Over against me, set on its hill, I saw the lighted windows of the kirk of Crossmichael. Well I knew what that meant. Mine enemies were sitting there in conclave. They would not rise till I was no more minister of the Kirk of Scotland. They would thrust me out, and whither should I go? To what folk could I minister – an it were not, like Alexander-Jonita, to the wild beasts of the hills? A day before I should have been elated at the thought. But now, for the first time, I saw myself unworthy.

Who was I, that thought so highly of myself, that I should appoint me Standard Bearer of the noble banner of the Covenants. A man weak as other men! Nay, infinitely weaker and worse. The meanest hind who worked in the fields to bring home four silver shillings a week to his wife and bairns was better than I.

A Standard Bearer! I laughed now at the thought, and the rushes by the water’s edges chuckled and sneered in answering derision.

A Standard Bearer, God wot! Renegade and traitor, rather; a man who could not keep his plain vows, whose erring and wandering heart went after vanities; one that had broken a maiden’s heart – unwitting and unintending, did he pretend? Faugh! that was what every Lovelace alleged as his excuse.

I had thought myself worthy to do battle for the purity of the Kirk of my fathers. I had pretended that her independence, her position and her power were dearer than life to me. I saw it all now. It was mine own place and position I had been warring for.

Also had I not set myself above my brethren? Had I not said, “Get far from me, for am I not holier than thou?”

And God, who does not pay His wages on Saturday night, had waited. So now He came to me and said, “Who art thou, Quintin MacClellan, that thou shouldst dare to touch the ark of God?”

And as I looked across the dark waters I saw the light burn clearer and clearer in the kirk of Crossmichael. They were lighting more candles that they might see the better to make an end.

“God speed them,” cried I, in the darkness; “they are doing God’s work. For they could do nothing except it were permitted of Him. Shall I step into the boat that rocks and clatters with the little wavelets leaping against its side? Shall I call John the ferryman and go over and make my submission before them all?”

I could tell them what an unworthy, forsworn, ill-hearted man I am.

Thus I stood by the riverside. Almost I had lifted up my voice to cry aloud that I would make this acknowledgment and reparation, when through the darkness I saw a shape approach.

A voice said in my ear, “Come – Jean Gemmell is taken suddenly ill. She would see you at once.”

Then I was aware that this 30th of December was to be my great day of judgment and wrath, when the six vials were to be loosed upon me. I knew that the Lord whose name I had taken in vain was that day to smite me with a great smiting, because, being unworthy, I had put out my hand to stay the ark of the covenant of God.

“Hob,” said I, for it was my brother who had come to summon me, “is she yet alive?”

“Alive!” said he, abruptly. “Why, bless the man, she wants you to marry her.”

“Marry – ” said I, “I am a minister of the kirk. I have ever spoken against irregular marriages. How can I marry without another minister?”

Hob laughed a short laugh. He never thought much of my love-making.

“Better marry than burn!” quoth he, abruptly. “Mr. Hepburn, of Buittle Kirk, is here. He came over to hearten you in the day of your adversity.”

Then I recognised the hand of God in the thing and bowed my head.

So in an aching expectant silence, hearing only a poor divided heart pulse within me, I followed Hob over the moor, and up by the sides of the frozen mosses to the house of Drumglass. He knew the way blindfold, which shows what a wonderful gift he had among the hills. For I myself had gone that way ten times for his once. Yet that night, save for my brother, I had stumbled to my hurt among the crags.

Presently we came to the entering in of the farmyard. Lights were gleaming here and there, and I saw some of the servant men clustered at the stable door.

There was a hush of expectation about the place, as if they were waiting for some notable thing which was about to happen.

Nathan Gemmell met me in the outer hall, and shook me by the hand silently, like a chief mourner at a funeral. Then he led the way into the inner room. Hepburn came forward also, and took my hand. He was a man of dark and determined countenance, yet with singularly lovable eyes which now and then unexpectedly beaconed kindliness.

Jean sat on a great chair, and beside her stood Alexander-Jonita.

When I came in Jean rose firmly to her feet. She looked about her with a proud look like one that would say, “See, all ye people, this is he!”

“Quintin!” she said, and laying her thin fingers on my shoulders, she looked deep into my eyes.

Never did I meet such a look. It seemed to be compound of life and death, of the love earthly and the love eternal.

“Good friends,” she said, calmly turning to them as though she had been the minister and accustomed to speak in the hearing of men, “I have summoned my love hastily. I have somewhat to say to him. Will you leave us alone for ten minutes? I have a word to say in his ear alone. It is not strange, is it, at such a time?”

And she smiled brightly upon them, while I stood dumb and astonished. For I knew not whence the lass, ordinarily so still and fond, had gotten her language. She spoke as one who has long made up his mind, and to whom fit and prepared words come without effort.

When they were gone she sat down on the chair again, and, taking my hand, motioned me to kneel down beside her.

Then she laid her hand to my hair and touched it lightly.

“Quintin,” she said, “you and I have not long to sit sweethearting together. I must say quickly that which I have to say. I am, you will peradventure think, a bold, immodest lass. You remember it was I who courted you, compelled you, followed you, spied on you. But then, you see, I loved you. Now I want to ask you to marry me!”

“Nay,” she said, interrupting my words more with her hand than her voice, “misjudge me not. I am to die – to die soon. It has been revealed to me that I have bartered the life eternal for this. And, since so it is, I desire to drink the sweetness of it to the cup’s bottom. I have made a bargain with God. I have prayed, and I have promised that if He will put it in your heart to wed with me for an hour, I will take with gratitude and thankfulness all that lies waiting over there, beyond the Black River.”

She waved her hand down toward the Dee water.

I smiled and nodded hopefully and comfortingly to her. At that moment I felt that nothing was too great for me to do. And it mattered little when I married her. I had ever meant to be true to her – save in that which I could not help, the love of my heart of hearts, which, having been another’s from the beginning was not mine to give.

Jean Gemmell smiled.

“I thank you, Quintin,” she said, “this is like you, and better than I deserve. Had it been a matter of days or weeks I would never have troubled you. But ’tis only the matter of an hour or two!”

She paused a little, stroking my head fondly.

“And afterwards you will say, remembering me, ‘Poor young thing, she loved me, loved me truly!’ Ah, Quintin, I think I should have made you a good wife. Love helps all things, they say. Put your hand below my head, Quintin. Tell me again that you love me. Sweetheart” (now she was whispering), “do you know I have to tell you all that you should say to me? Is that fair – that I should make love to you and to myself too?”

I groaned aloud.

“God help us, Jean,” I said, “we shall yet be happy together.” And at the moment I meant it. I felt that a lifetime of sacrifice would not make up for such love.

She patted me on the head pacifyingly as if I had been a fractious bairn that needed humouring.

“Yes, yes, then,” she said, soothingly, “we shall be happy, you and I. What was it you said the other Sabbath day? I knew not what it meant then. But methinks I begin to understand now – ‘passing the love of woman!’”

The cough shook her, but she strove to hide it, going on quickly with her words like one who has no time to lose.

“That is the way I love you, Quintin, ‘passing the love of women,’ Why, I do not even grudge you to her.”

She smiled again, and said cheerfully, “Now we will call them in.”

I was going to the door to do it according to her word, for that night we all obeyed her as though she had been the Queen. I was almost at the door when she rose all trembling to her feet and held out her arms entreatingly.

“Quintin, Quintin, kiss me once,” she said, “once before they come.”

I ran to her and kissed her on the brow. “Oh, not there! On the mouth. It is my right. I have paid for it!” she cried. And so I did.

Then she drew down my head and set her lips to my ear. “I lied to you, laddie – yes, I lied. I do grudge you to her. Oh, I do, I do!”

And for the first time one mighty sob caught her by the throat and rent her.

Nevertheless she straightened herself with her hand to her breast, like a wounded soldier who salutes his general ere he dies, and commanded her emotion. “Yes,” she said, looking upwards and speaking as if to one unseen, “I will play the game fairly; I have promised and I will not repine, nor go back on my word!”

She turned to me, “It is not a time for bairn’s greeting. We are to be married, you and I, are we not? Call them in.”

And she laughed a little bashfully and fitly as the folk came in and smiled to one and the other as they entered.

Then to me she beckoned.

“Come and hold my hand all the time. Clasp my fingers firmly. Do not let them go lest I slip away too soon, Quintin. I need your hand in mine – for to-night, Quintin, just only for this one night!”

Even thus Jean Gemmell and I were married.

And after all was done I laid her on her bed, and she rested there till near the dawning with my hand firmly held in hers. Mostly her eyes were shut, but every now and then she would smile up at me like one that encourages another in a weary wait.

Once she said, “Isn’t it sweet?”

And then again, and near to the gloaming of the morn, she whispered, “It will not be long now, laddie mine?”

Nor was it, for within an hour the soul of Jean Gemmell went out in one long loving look, and with the faintest murmur of her lips which only my ear could catch – “Passing the love of women,” she said, and again – “passing the love of women!”

And it was my hand alone that spread the fair white cloth over her dead face which still had the smile upon it, and over the pale lips that she had asked me to kiss.

Then, as I stumbled blindly down the hill, I looked beyond the dark and sluggish river rolling beneath over to the Kirk of Crossmichael. And even as I stood looking, the lights in the windows went out. It was done. I was a man in one day widowed, forsaken, outcast.

But more than kirk or ministry or even Christ’s own covenant, I thought upon Jean Gemmell.

CHAPTER XXVII

RUMOUR OF WAR

The crown had indeed been set upon the work. The business, as said the Right Reverend Presbytery, was finished, and with well-satisfied hearts the brethren went back to their manses.

It was long ere in his private capacity my brother could lift up his head or speak to us that were about him. The dark day and darker night of the 30th of December had sorely changed him. He was like one standing alone, the world ranged against him. Then I that was his brother according to the flesh watched him carefully. Never did he pace by the rivers of waters nor yet climb the heathery steeps of the Dornal without a companion. There were times when almost we feared for his reason. But Quintin MacClellan, the deposed minister of Balmaghie, was not the stuff of which self-slayers are made.

When it chanced that I could not accompany him, I had nothing to do but arrange with Alexander-Jonita, and she would take the hill or the water-edge, silent as a shadow, tireless as a young deer. And with her to guard I knew that my brother was safe.

Never did he know that any watched him, for during these days he was a man walking with shadows. I think he never ceased blaming himself for poor Jean’s death. At any rate Quintin MacClellan was a changed man for long after that night.

My mother came down from Ardarroch to bide a while with him, and at orra times he aroused himself somewhat to talk with her. But when she began to speak of the ill-set Presbytery, or even of the more familiar things at home – the nowt, the horse, and the kindly kye – I, who watched every shade on Quintin’s face as keenly as if he had been my sweetheart, knew well that his mind was wandering. And sometimes I thought it was set on the dead lass, and sometimes I thought that he mourned for the public misfortune which had befallen him.

To the outer world, the world of the parish and the countryside, he kept ever a brave face. He preached with yet more mighty power and acceptance. The little kirk was crowded Sabbath after Sabbath. Those who had once spoken against him did it no more openly in the parish of Balmaghie.

With calm front and assured carriage he went about his duties, as though there were no Presbyteries nor forces military to carry out his sentence of removal and deposition.

Only the chief landowners wished him away. For mostly they were men of evil life, rough-spoken and darkly tarred with scandal. My brother had been over-faithful with them in reproof. For it was of Quintin that an old wife had said, “God gie thee the fear o’ Himsel’, laddie! For faith, ye haena the fear o’ man aboot ye!”

But there were others who could take steps as well as Presbyteries and officers of the law.

Alexander-Jonita rode like a storm-cloud up and down the glen and listed the lads to do her will, as indeed they were ever all too ready to do. Her father, with several of the elders, men grave and reverend, met to concert measures for defending the bounds, lest the enemy should try to oust their minister out of his “warm nest,” as they called the manse which cowered down under lee of the kirk.

So it came about that there was scarce a man in Balmaghie who was not enrolled to protect the passage perilous of kirk and manse. The parish became almost like a defended city or an entrenched camp. There were watchers upon the hilltops everywhere. Week-day and Sabbath-day they abode there. All the fords were guarded, the river-fronts patrolled, for save on the wild and mountainous side our parish is surrounded by waters deep and broad or else rapid and dangerous.

Did a couple of ministers approach from Crossmichael to “preach the kirk vacant” their boat was pushed back again into the stream, and a hundred men stood in line to prevent a landing. Yet all was carried out with decency and order, as men do who have taken a great matter in hand and are prepared to stand within their danger.

The elders also held mysterious colloquies with men from a distance, who went and came to their houses under cloud of night. There was discipline and drill by Gideon Henderson and other former officers of the Scotch Dutch regiments. I remember a muster on the meadows of the Duchrae at which a stern-faced man, with his face half muffled, came and put us through our duty. I knew by the tones of his voice that this was none other than the Colonel Sir William Gordon who had marched with us to Edinburgh in the great convention year.

But the climax was yet to come.

It was in July that the Sheriff had first tried in vain to land at the Kirk-Knowe in order to expel my brother from his manse. But a hundred men had started up out of the bushes, and with levelled pistols turned the boat back again to the further shore.

Next there was a gathering of the Presbytery at Cullenoch, under the wing of the Laird of Balmaghie, to concert measures with the other landowners, who in time past had often smarted under Quintin’s rebuke. It was to be held at the inn, and the debate was to settle many things.

But alas! when the day came every room in the hostel was filled with armed men, so that there was no place for the reverend fathers and their terrified hosts.

So without in the wide spaces where four roads meet, the Presbyters one by one addressed the people, if addresses they could be called, which were interrupted at every other sentence.

It was Warner, the father of the Presbytery, who was speaking when I arrived. He was one of those who had sat safe and snug under the King’s indulgences and agreements in the days of persecution.

“People of Balmaghie,” he cried, “hearken to me. Ye are supporting a man that is no minister, a man outed and deposed. Your children will be unbaptized, your marriages unblessed, yourselves excommunicated, because of this man!”

“Maister Warner,” cried a voice from the crowd, which I knew for that of Drumglass, “I am auld eneuch to mind how ye were a member in the Presbytery at Sunday-wall that sat on Richard Cameron in order to depose him. Now ye wad spend your persecuting breath on our young minister. Gang hame, man, and think on your latter end!”

But, indeed, as half-a-dozen bare swords were within a yard of his nose, Mr. Warner might quite as well have thought on his latter end where he was.

Then it was Cameron’s turn. But him the people would not listen to on any protest, because he had been accounted chief agent and mover in the process of law against their minister.

“Better ye had died at Ayrsmoss wi’ you twa brithers,” they cried to him; “man, ye’ll never win nearer to them than Kirkcudbright town. And Guid kens that’s an awesome lang road frae heeven!”

To Telfair the Ghost-seer of Rerrick, they cried, when he strove to say a word, “What for did ye no bring the deil wi’ ye in a bag? Man, ye are ower great wi’ him. But there’s neither witch nor warlock can look at MacClellan’s cup nor come near our minister. It’s easy seen Quintin MacClellan wasna in the Presbytery when the deil played sic pliskies doon aboot the Rerrick shores.”

Then came Boyd, who in his day had proclaimed King William at Glasgow Cross. But he found that an easier task than to shout down the cause of righteousness at the Four Roads of Pluckemin.

“You pay overmuch attention to the words of a man without honour!” This was his beginning, heard over all the crowd to the very midst of the street, for he had a great voice, which in a better cause would have been listened to like the voice of an apostle.

“Have ye paid back the siller the poor hill-folk spent on your colleging?” they asked him. “Our minister paid for his ain schooling.”

The question was a feathered arrow in the white, but Boyd avoided it.

“Your minister is a man that should be ashamed to enter a kirk and preach the Gospel. Who would associate with the like of Quintin MacClellan?”

“Of a certainty not traitors and turncoats!” cried a deep voice in the background, toward which all turned in amazement.

It was that of Sir Alexander Gordon of Earlstoun, the reputed head of the Societies, whose boast it had been that he could call seven thousand men to arms in the day of trouble.

I saw Boyd pale to the lips at sight of him.

“I do not argue with sectaries!” he stammered, turning on his heel.

“Nor I with knavish deceivers,” cried Alexander Gordon, “of whom there are two here – Andrew Cameron and William Boyd. With this right hand I paid them the golden money for their education, wrung from the instant needs of poor hill folk who had lost their all, and who depended oftentime on charity for their bite of bread. From men attainted, from men earning in foreign lands the bitter bread of exile, from men and women imprisoned, shilling by shilling, penny by penny, that money came. It was ill-spent on men like these. William Boyd and Andrew Cameron swore solemn oaths. They took upon them the unbreakable and immutable Covenants. In time they became ministers, and we looked for words of light and wisdom and guidance from them. But we of the Faithful Remnant looked in vain. For lo! Cæsar sat upon his throne, and right gladly they bowed the knee. They licked the gold from his garments like honey. They mumbled his shoe-string that he might graciously permit them to sit at ease in his high places.

“Bah!” he cried, so that his voice was heard miles off on the hill-tops, “out upon all such cowards and traitors! And now, folk of this parish, will ye let such scurril loons persuade you to give up your true and faithful minister, on whose tongue is the word of truth, and in whose heart is no fear of the face of any man?”

The frightened Presbyters melted before him, some of them swarming off with the men of evil life – the lairds and heritors of the parish. Others mounted their horses and rode homeward as if the devil of Rerrick himself had been after them.

Thus was ended the Disputation of Cullenoch near to Clachanpluck, in the shaming of those that withstood us.

CHAPTER XXVIII

ALEXANDER-JONITA’S VICTORY

But as for my brother, concerning whom was all this pother, he took no hand at all in the matter. If the people wished him to abide with them, they must maintain him there. Contrariwise, if the Master he served had other fields of labour, he would break down dykes and make plain his path before him.

But as it was, he went about as usual with his pilgrim staff in his hand visiting the sick, succouring the poor, lifting up the head of weakness and pain.

On the day when the Sheriff came with his men to the water-edge, Quintin saw from the manse window a little cloud of men running hither and thither upon the river-bank.

“There is surely some great ploy of fishing afoot!” he said, quietly, and so let his eyes fall again contentedly upon his book.

“Faith, ’tis easy to hoodwink a learned man,” cried Alexander-Jonita when I told her.

It was at this time that I grew to love the lass yet more and more. For she flashed hither and thither, and whereas she had been no great one for housework hitherto, now since her sister’s death she would be much more indoors. Also, with the old man her father, she was exceedingly patient in his oftentime garrulity. But specially in the defence of the parish on Quintin’s behalf against the civil arm, she was indefatigable.

Often she would go dressed as a heartsome young callant, with clothes that her own needle had made, her own deft fingers fashioned. And in cavalier attire, I tell you, Alexander-Jonita took the eyes of lass and lady. Once, when we rode by Dee-bridge, a haughty dame sent back her servant to ask of me, whom she took to be a man-in-waiting, the name of the handsome young gentleman I served.

I replied with dignity, “’Tis the young Lord Alexander Johnstone,” which was as near the truth as I could come at a quick venture.

In that crowning ploy of which I have still to tell, it was Alexander-Jonita who played the leading part.