David Fleming's Forgiveness Part 32

"No. I am glad she is no worse. It was not that I thought her dying.

I came for another reason."

"Well, you are kindly welcome anyway."

"I went to see Squire Holt this morning. No--he is not dying, though it cannot be long now."

"Ay! ay! Well, he is an old man, and he is ending a useful life."

He spoke dreamily in his utter weariness, looking away over the fields to the suns.h.i.+ny hills beyond.

"I have something to give you, Mr Fleming," said the minister gently, "something which Miss Holt found among her father's papers."

"Well, well," said the old man, waiting quietly, almost indifferently, for what might be said.

"It is a letter, written long ago by one dead and gone, who was very dear to you."

A change came over her grandfather's face, but whether it was because of what Mr Maxwell had said, or because he saw Jacob Holt standing before him, and quite near him, Katie could not tell. Jacob moistened his dry lips, and tried twice to speak before a sound came.

"It is a letter--and before you read it--I beg you to forgive me for any harm I may ever have done--to you or yours."

The little Flemings had gathered about the door, but their mother drew them away into the house. Katie kept her place by her grandfather, and so did Davie, but he was out of sight in the porch. Mr Fleming rose, and stood face to face with his enemy; but when he spoke it was to Mr Maxwell that he turned.

"She said, she could never go--up yonder--till I have forgiven him--and I am an old man, now."

He tottered a little as he turned to Jacob, but he held out his hand:

"G.o.d forgive you. And G.o.d help me to forgive you. And G.o.d forgive me too, for I doubt it has been rebellion with me all this time."

"Amen," said Jacob, and then he moved away, and Mr Fleming sank down on the seat again. He seemed to have forgotten that there was anything more to be said, and after a moment's hesitation, Mr Maxwell put the letter into Katie's hand.

"The letter, grandfather," said she softly.

"Ay, the letter."

He took it, holding it out at arm's length that he might see, but when his eye rested on the familiar characters he uttered a sharp, inarticulate cry and let it fall. The blood rushed to his face till it was crimson, and then receding, left him pale as death.

"Grandfather, come into grannie," said Katie, putting her arms about him. "Davie, come and help our grandfather."

"Grannie's better, grandfather," said Davie; "come."

"But the letter," said the old man, faintly. "Oh, ay! Grandmother will like to see the letter!"

But he did not rise.

"The letter. Where's the letter?"

Jacob Holt stooped and lifted it from the gra.s.s where it had fallen, and Davie looked at him with amazed and angry eyes, as he opened it and taking out the folded slip of paper, offered it to him, while he kept the squire's letter and the money in his hand.

"Read that first," said Jacob hoa.r.s.ely, and then he went away round the corner of the house out of sight, and Mr Maxwell followed him.

"Read it, Katie, la.s.sie."

With trembling fingers Davie opened the letter and gave it to his sister. Kneeling beside him, Katie read:

"Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son."

There was more written, but she got no further, for a cry burst from his lips--whether of joy or pain they could not tell--and his head fell on Katie's shoulder.

"Whisht, Davie. Lay him down gently, and get a little water. Be quiet, man. Grannie will hear you."

For Davie had cried out in his terror at the sight of his grandfather's deathlike face. The cry brought out his mother, and Mr Maxwell and Jacob hurried back again. He was better in a minute, and they led him into the house, and made him lie down. In a little while Katie brought him some tea.

"Grannie bade me, grandfather, and you must take it you ken."

She knelt beside him, holding the cup for him, and by coaxing and entreating made him take a little food.

"And now you must just rest a while."

They had brought him into the front room "for quiet," Katie said, as he looked round in surprise; "rest and think about it," she whispered, hardly venturing to say more. Gradually it came back to him that something had happened. By this time breakfast was over, and wors.h.i.+p, and Katie brought Mr Maxwell in and left him there.

Jacob Holt would not stay to breakfast, though Davie and his mother had asked him to stay. Before he went he gave the squire's letter to Davie.

"Give it to your grandfather, but do not read it," said he.

He had something to say to Mr Maxwell also.

"I don't know just how much Mr Fleming knows of what happened long ago.

Hugh Fleming, after much entreaty from several of us, signed my father's name where he ought not. He alone had the skill to do it. It was to save--some of us from much trouble. He was not in the sc.r.a.pe.

He was not to be benefited personally by it, except that he was persuaded that some foolish deed of his could be more easily kept from his father's knowledge if he helped to screen the rest by yielding. If he had stayed at home and met it, it would have been well; my father made no trouble about it. But he went away--and died. And you must tell his father--"

Jacob turned his back upon the minister for a full minute, and then without another word went away.

It was Mr Maxwell who read the letter to Mr Fleming after all. There were only a few lines more than Katie read: "I trust G.o.d has forgiven me, and that He will keep me safe from sin. Forgive me, dear father and mother and James."

And then his name and another line: "I will make up to you, dear father, for all you suffer now for me."

"And He has kept him safe," said the minister, "all these years."

Katie came now and then, and looked in, but she did not speak, except once to say that grannie was sleeping still. Even Katie never knew how the minister and her grandfather pa.s.sed the long morning. It was noon when she went in and told them that dinner was nearly ready, and that grannie was awake and asking for them. Afterward Mr Maxwell told Miss Elizabeth something about it.

How as it gradually became clear to the father that his dear son's light had not gone out in darkness, but that he had repented of his sin, and confessed it, and had been as he trusted forgiven, his grief and shame and penitence were even deeper than his joy.

"To think that I should have been mis...o...b..ing the Lord all this time, as though He had broken His promise to me! And how patient He has been-- long-suffering and full of compa.s.sion. I have been hard on Jacob Holt.

If G.o.d had dealt with me as I have in my heart dealt with him!"

The minister did not always know whether he was speaking to him, or to himself. By and by, when he got calmer, and "better acquainted" with the thought of the new joy, he told the minister, in broken words, the story of his love for his son, and the bitterness of his loss, and his wonder and sympathy grew as he listened.

What depths of woe the old man had sounded! With what agonies of bitterness and anger which had grown to be hatred almost, as the years went on, had he struggled. And he had sometimes yielded to the misery of doubt of G.o.d's care. He had thought the struggle vain.