"You can't do better," said Mr Graham. "The report itself may be false—or true, and the lady mistaken."
"She'll hae to pruv 't weel afore I say haud," rejoined Malcolm.
"And suppose she does?"
"In that case," said Malcolm, with a composure almost ghastly, "a man maun tak what mither it pleases God to gie him. But faith! she winna du wi' me as wi' the puir laird. Gien she taks me up, she'll repent 'at she didna lat me lie. She'll be as little pleased wi' the tane o' her sons as the tither—I can tell her, ohn propheseed!"
"But think what you might do between mother and son," suggested the master, willing to reconcile him to the possible worst.
"It's ower late for that," he answered. "The puir man's thairms (fiddle-strings) are a' hingin' lowse, an' there's no grip eneuch i' the pegs to set them up again. He wad but think I had gane ower to the enemy, an' haud oot o' my gait as eident (diligently) as he hauds oot o' hers. Na, it wad du naething for him. Gien 't warna for what I see in him, I wad hae a gran' rebutter to her claim; for hoo cud ony wuman's ain son hae sic a scunner at her as I hae i' my hert an' brain an' verra stamach? Gien she war my ain mither, there bude to be some nait'ral drawin's atween 's, a body wad think. But it winna haud, for there's the laird! The verra name o' mither gars him steik his lugs an' rin."
"Still, if she be your mother, it 's for better for worse as much as if she had been your own choice."
"I kenna weel hoo it cud be for waur," said Malcolm, who did not yet, even from his recollection of the things Miss Horn had said, comprehend what worst threatened him.
"It does seem strange," said the master thoughtfully, after a pause, "that some women should be allowed to be mothers that through them sons and daughters of God should come into the world—thief babies, say! human parasites, with no choice but feed on the social body!"
"I wonner what God thinks aboot it a'! It gars a body spier whether he cares or no," said Malcolm gloomily.
"It does," responded Mr Graham solemnly.
"Div ye alloo that, sir?" returned Malcolm aghast. "That soon's as gien a'thing war rushin' thegither back to the auld chaos."
"I should not be surprised," continued the master, apparently heedless of Malcolm's consternation, "if the day should come when well meaning men, excellent in the commonplace, but of dwarfed imagination, refused to believe in a God on the ground of apparent injustice in the very frame and constitution of things. Such would argue, that there might be either an omnipotent being who did not care, or a good being who could not help; but that there could not be a being both all good and omnipotent, for such would never have suffered things to be as they are."
"What wad the clergy say to hear ye, sir?" said Malcolm, himself almost trembling at the words of his master.
"Nothing to the purpose, I fear. They would never face the question. I know what they would do if they could,—burn me, as their spiritual ancestor, Calvin, would have done—whose shoe latchet they are yet not worthy to unloose. But mind, my boy, you've not heard me speak my thought on the matter at all."
"But wadna 't be better to believe in twa Gods nor nane ava'?" propounded Malcolm; "ane a' guid, duin' the best for 's he cud, the ither a' ill, but as pooerfu' as the guid ane—an' forever an' aye a fecht atween them, whiles ane gettin' the warst o' 't, an whiles the ither? It wad quaiet yer hert ony gait, an' the battle o' Armageddon wad gang on as gran' 's ever."
"Two Gods there could not be," said Mr Graham. "Of the two beings supposed, the evil one must be called devil were he ten times the more powerful."
"Wi' a' my hert!" responded Malcolm.
"But I agree with you," the master went on, that "Manicheism is unspeakably better than atheism, and unthinkably better than believing in an unjust God. But I am not driven to such a theory."
"Hae ye ane o' yer ain 'at 'll fit, sir?"
"If I knew of a theory in which was never an uncompleted arch or turret, in whose circling wall was never a ragged breach, that theory I should know but to avoid: such gaps are the eternal windows through which the dawn shall look in. A complete theory is a vault of stone around the theorist—whose very being yet depends on room to grow."
"Weel, I wad like to hear what ye hae agane Manicheism!"
"The main objection of theologians would be, I presume, that it did not present a God perfect in power as in goodness; but I think it a far more objectionable point that it presents evil as possessing power in itself. My chief objection, however, would be a far deeper one—namely, that its good being cannot be absolutely good; for, if he knew himself unable to insure the well being of his creatures, if he could not avoid exposing them to such foreign attack, had he a right to create them? Would he have chosen such a doubtful existence for one whom he meant to love absolutely?—Either, then, he did not love like a God, or he would not have created."
"He micht ken himsel' sure to win i' the lang rin."
"Grant the same to the God of the Bible, and we come back to where we were before."
"Does that satisfee yersel', Maister Graham?" asked Malcolm, looking deep into the eyes of his teacher.
"Not at all," answered the master.
"Does onything?"
"Yes: but I will not say more on the subject now. The time may come when I shall have to speak that which I have learned, but it is not yet. All I will say now is, that I am at peace concerning the question. Indeed, so utterly do I feel myself the offspring of the One, that it would be enough for my peace now—I don't say it would have been always—to know my mind troubled on a matter: what troubled me would trouble God: my trouble at the seeming wrong must have its being in the right existent in him. In him, supposing I could find none I should yet say there must lie a lucent, harmonious, eternal, not merely consoling, but absolutely satisfying solution."
"Winna ye tell me a' 'at 's in yer hert aboot it, sir?"
"Not now, my boy. You have got one thing to mind now—before all other things—namely, that you give this woman—whatever she be—fair play: if she be your mother, as such you must take her, that is, as such you must treat her."
"ye're richt, sir," returned Malcolm, and rose.
"Come back to me," said Mr Graham, "with whatever news you gather."
"I will, sir," answered Malcolm, and went to find Miss Horn. He was shown into the little parlour, which, for all the grander things he had been amongst of late, had lost nothing of its first charm. There sat Miss Horn.
"Sit doon, Ma'colm," she said gruffly.
"Hae ye h'ard onything, mem?" asked Malcolm, standing.
"Ower muckle," answered Miss Horn, with all but a scowl. "Ye been ower to Gersefell, I reckon."
"Forbid it!" answered Malcolm. "Never till this hoor—or at maist it 's nae twa sin' I h'ard the first cheep o' 't, an' that was frae Meg Partan. To nae human sowl hae I made mention o' 't yet 'cep' Maister Graham: to him I gaed direck."
"Ye cudna hae dune better," said the grim woman, with relaxing visage.
"An' here I am the noo, straucht frae him, to beg o' you, Miss Horn, to tell me the trowth o' the maitter."
"What ken I aboot it?" she returned angrily. "What sud I ken?"
"Ye micht ken whether the wuman's been sayin' 't or no."
"Wha has ony doobt aboot that?"
"Mistress Stewart has been sayin' she's my mither, than?"
"Ay—what for no?" returned Miss Horn, with a piercing glower at the youth.
"Guid forfen'!" exclaimed Malcolm.
"Say ye that, laddie?" cried Miss Horn, and, starting up, she grasped his arm and stood gazing in his face.
"What ither sud I say?" rejoined Malcolm, surprised.
"God be laudit!" exclaimed Miss Horn. "The limmer may say 'at she likes noo."
"Ye dinna believe 't than, mem?" cried Malcolm. "Tell me ye dinna, an' haud me ohn curst like a cadger."
"I dinna believe ae word o' 't, laddie," answered Miss Horn eagerly. "Wha cud believe sic a fine laad come o' sic a fause mither?"
"She micht be ony body's mither, an' fause tu," said Malcolm gloomily.