The Standard Bearer

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

(Connect and Addition by Hob MacClellan.)

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.