Chapter Twenty-Three.
CONTAINS A BIRTH, WHICH IS SUFFICIENT FOR ONE CHAPTER.
"The kirk bell will soon be ringing," Nanny said on the followingmorning, as she placed herself carefully on a stool, one hand holdingher Bible and the other wandering complacently over her aged merinogown. "Ay, lassie, though you're only an Egyptian I would hae ta'enyou wi' me to hear Mr. Duthie, but it's speiring ower muckle o' awoman to expect her to gang to the kirk in her ilka day claethes."
The Babbie of yesterday would have laughed at this, but the new Babbiesighed.
"I wonder you don't go to Mr. Dishart's church now, Nanny," she said,gently. "I am sure you prefer him."
"Babbie, Babbie," exclaimed Nanny, with spirit, "may I never be so farleft to mysel' as to change my kirk just because I like anotherminister better! It's easy seen, lassie, that you ken little o'religious questions."
"Very little," Babbie admitted, sadly.
"But dinna be so waeful about it," the old woman continued, kindly,"for that's no nane like you. Ay, and if you see muckle mair o' Mr.Dishart he'll soon cure your ignorance."
"I shall not see much more of him," Babbie answered, with avertedhead.
"The like o' you couldna expect it," Nanny said, simply, whereuponBabbie went to the window. "I had better be stepping," Nanny said,rising, "for I am aye late unless I'm on the hill by the time thebell begins. Ay, Babbie, I'm doubting my merino's no sair in thefashion?"
She looked down at her dress half despondently, and yet with somepride.
"It was fowerpence the yard, and no less," she went on, fondling theworn merino, "when we bocht it at Sam'l Curr's. Ay, but it has beenturned sax times since syne."
She sighed, and Babbie came to her and put her arms round her, saying,"Nanny, you are a dear."
"I'm a gey auld-farrant-looking dear, I doubt," said Nanny, ruefully.
"Now, Nanny," rejoined Babbie, "you are just wanting me to flatteryou. You know the merino looks very nice."
"It's a guid merino yet," admitted the old woman, "but, oh, Babbie,what does the material matter if the cut isna fashionable? It's fine,isn't it, to be in the fashion?"
She spoke so wistfully that, instead of smiling, Babbie kissed her.
"I am afraid to lay hand on the merino, Nanny, but give me off yourbonnet and I'll make it ten years younger in as many minutes."
"Could you?" asked Nanny, eagerly, unloosening her bonnet-strings."Mercy on me!" she had to add; "to think about altering bonnets on theSabbath-day! Lassie, how could you propose sic a thing?"
"Forgive me, Nanny," Babbie replied, so meekly that the old womanlooked at her curiously.
"IT'S A GUID MERINO YET."]
"I dinna understand what has come ower you," she said. "There's anunca difference in you since last nicht. I used to think you were mairlike a bird than a lassie, but you've lost a' your daft capers o'singing and lauching, and I take ill wi't. Twa or three times I'vecatched you greeting. Babbie, what has come ower you?"
"Nothing, Nanny. I think I hear the bell."
Down in Thrums two kirk-officers had let their bells loose, wakingechoes in Windyghoul as one dog in country parts sets all the othersbarking, but Nanny did not hurry off to church. Such a surprisingnotion had filled her head suddenly that she even forgot to hold herdress off the floor.
"Babbie," she cried, in consternation, "dinna tell me you've gottenower fond o' Mr. Dishart."
"The like of me, Nanny!" the gypsy answered, with affected raillery,but there was a tear in her eye.
"It would be a wild, presumptious thing," Nanny said, "and him a grandminister, but----"
Babbie tried to look her in the face, but failed, and then all at oncethere came back to Nanny the days when she and her lover wandered thehill together.
"Ah, my dawtie," she cried, so tenderly, "what does it matter wha heis when you canna help it!"
Two frail arms went round the Egyptian, and Babbie rested her head onthe old woman's breast. But do you think it could have happened hadnot Nanny loved a weaver two-score years before?
And now Nanny has set off for church and Babbie is alone in the mudhouse. Some will pity her not at all, this girl who was a dozen womenin the hour, and all made of impulses that would scarce stand still tobe photographed. To attempt to picture her at any time until now wouldhave been like chasing a spirit that changes to something else as yourarms clasp it; yet she has always seemed a pathetic little figure tome. If I understand Babbie at all, it is, I think, because I lovedMargaret, the only woman I have ever known well, and one whose naturewas not, like the Egyptian's, complex, but most simple, as if God hadtold her only to be good. Throughout my life since she came into itshe has been to me a glass in which many things are revealed that Icould not have learned save through her, and something of allwomankind, even of bewildering Babbie, I seem to know because I knewMargaret.
No woman is so bad but we may rejoice when her heart thrills tolove, for then God has her by the hand. There is no love but this.She may dream of what love is, but it is only of a sudden that sheknows. Babbie, who was without a guide from her baby days, haddreamed but little of it, hearing its name given to another thing.She had been born wild and known no home; no one had touched herheart except to strike it, she had been educated, but never tamed;her life had been thrown strangely among those who were great in theworld's possessions, but she was not of them. Her soul was in suchdarkness that she had never seen it; she would have danced awaycynically from the belief that there is such a thing, and now all atonce she had passed from disbelief to knowledge. Is not love God'sdoing? To Gavin He had given something of Himself, and the moment shesaw it the flash lit her own soul.
It was but little of his Master that was in Gavin, but far smallerthings have changed the current of human lives; the spider's threadthat strikes our brow on a country road may do that. Yet this I willsay, though I have no wish to cast the little minister on my pageslarger than he was, that he had some heroic hours in Thrums, of whichone was when Babbie learned to love him. Until the moment when hekissed her she had only conceived him a quaint fellow whose life was astring of Sundays, but behold what she saw in him now. Evidently tohis noble mind her mystery was only some misfortune, not of hermaking, and his was to be the part of leading her away from it intothe happiness of the open life. He did not doubt her, for he loved,and to doubt is to dip love in the mire. She had been given to him byGod, and he was so rich in her possession that the responsibilityattached to the gift was not grievous. She was his, and no mortal mancould part them. Those who looked askance at her were looking askanceat him; in so far as she was wayward and wild, he was those things; solong as she remained strange to religion, the blame lay on him.
All this Babbie read in the Gavin of the past night, and to her it wasthe book of love. What things she had known, said and done in thatholy name! How shamefully have we all besmirched it! She had onlyknown it as the most selfish of the passions, a brittle image that menconsulted because it could only answer in the words they gave it tosay. But here was a man to whom love was something better than his owndesires leering on a pedestal. Such love as Babbie had seen hithertomade strong men weak, but this was a love that made a weak man strong.All her life, strength had been her idol, and the weakness that bentto her cajolery her scorn. But only now was it revealed to her thatstrength, instead of being the lusty child of passions, grows bygrappling with and throwing them.
So Babbie loved the little minister for the best that she had everseen in man. I shall be told that she thought far more of him than hedeserved, forgetting the mean in the worthy: but who that has had aglimpse of heaven will care to let his mind dwell henceforth on earth?Love, it is said, is blind, but love is not blind. It is an extra eye,which shows us what is most worthy of regard. To see the best is tosee most clearly, and it is the lover's privilege.
Down in the Auld Licht kirk that forenoon Gavin preached a sermon inpraise of Woman, and up in the mudhouse in Windyghoul Babbie satalone. But it was the Sabbath
day to her: the first Sabbath in herlife. Her discovery had frozen her mind for a time, so that she couldonly stare at it with eyes that would not shut; but that had been inthe night. Already her love seemed a thing of years, for it was as oldas herself, as old as the new Babbie. It was such a dear delight thatshe clasped it to her, and exulted over it because it was hers, andthen she cried over it because she must give it up.
For Babbie must only look at this love and then turn from it. My heartaches for the little Egyptian, but the Promised Land would haveremained invisible to her had she not realized that it was only forothers. That was the condition of her seeing.