Robert Falconer Part 90

Andrew did not reply; but Robert saw when he turned next towards the light, that the sweat was standing in beads on his forehead.

'Father,' he said, going up to him.

The old man stopped in his walk, turned, and faced his son.

'Father,' repeated Robert, 'you've got to repent; and G.o.d won't let you off; and you needn't think it. You'll have to repent some day.'

'In h.e.l.l, Robert,' said Andrew, looking him full in the eyes, as he had never looked at him before. It seemed as if even so much acknowledgment of the truth had already made him bolder and honester.

'Yes. Either on earth or in h.e.l.l. Would it not be better on earth?'

'But it will be no use in h.e.l.l,' he murmured.

In those few words lay the germ of the preference for h.e.l.l of poor souls, enfeebled by wickedness. They will not have to do anything there--only to moan and cry and suffer for ever, they think. It is effort, the out-going of the living will that they dread. The sorrow, the remorse of repentance, they do not so much regard: it is the action it involves; it is the having to turn, be different, and do differently, that they shrink from; and they have been taught to believe that this will not be required of them there--in that awful refuge of the will-less. I do not say they think thus: I only say their dim, vague, feeble feelings are such as, if they grew into thought, would take this form. But tell them that the fire of G.o.d without and within them will compel them to bethink themselves; that the vision of an open door beyond the smoke and the flames will ever urge them to call up the ice-bound will, that it may obey; that the torturing spirit of G.o.d in them will keep their consciences awake, not to remind them of what they ought to have done, but to tell them what they must do now, and h.e.l.l will no longer fascinate them. Tell them that there is no refuge from the compelling Love of G.o.d, save that Love itself--that He is in h.e.l.l too, and that if they make their bed in h.e.l.l they shall not escape him, and then, perhaps, they will have some true presentiment of the worm that dieth not and the fire that is not quenched.

'Father, it will be of use in h.e.l.l,' said Robert. 'G.o.d will give you no rest even there. You will have to repent some day, I do believe--if not now under the suns.h.i.+ne of heaven, then in the torture of the awful world where there is no light but that of the conscience. Would it not be better and easier to repent now, with your wife waiting for you in heaven, and your mother waiting for you on earth?'

Will it be credible to my reader, that Andrew interrupted his son with the words,

'Robert, it is dreadful to hear you talk like that. Why, you don't believe in the Bible!'

His words will be startling to one who has never heard the lips of a h.o.a.ry old sinner drivel out religion. To me they are not so startling as the words of Christian women and bishops of the Church of England, when they say that the doctrine of the everlasting happiness of the righteous stands or falls with the doctrine of the hopeless d.a.m.nation of the wicked. Can it be that to such the word is everything, the spirit nothing? No. It is only that the devil is playing a very wicked prank, not with them, but in them: they are pluming themselves on being selfish after a G.o.dly sort.

'I do believe the Bible, father,' returned Robert, 'and have ordered my life by it. If I had not believed the Bible, I fear I should never have looked for you. But I won't dispute about it. I only say I believe that you will be compelled to repent some day, and that now is the best time.

Then, you will not only have to repent, but to repent that you did not repent now. And I tell you, father, that you shall go to my grandmother.'

CHAPTER XVI. CHANGE OF SCENE.

But various reasons combined to induce Falconer to postpone yet for a period their journey to the North. Not merely did his father require an unremitting watchfulness, which it would be difficult to keep up in his native place amongst old friends and acquaintances, but his health was more broken than he had at first supposed, and change of air and scene without excitement was most desirable. He was anxious too that the change his mother must see in him should be as little as possible attributable to other causes than those that years bring with them. To this was added that his own health had begun to suffer from the watching and anxiety he had gone through, and for his father's sake, as well as for the labour which yet lay before him, he would keep that as sound as he might. He wrote to his grandmother and explained the matter. She begged him to do as he thought best, for she was so happy that she did not care if she should never see Andrew in this world: it was enough to die in the hope of meeting him in the other. But she had no reason to fear that death was at hand; for, although much more frail, she felt as well as ever.

By this time Falconer had introduced me to his father. I found him in some things very like his son; in others, very different. His manners were more polished; his pleasure in pleasing much greater: his humanity had blossomed too easily, and then run to seed. Alas, to no seed that could bear fruit! There was a weak expression about his mouth--a wavering interrogation: it was so different from the firmly-closed portals whence issued the golden speech of his son! He had a sly, sidelong look at times, whether of doubt or cunning, I could not always determine. His eyes, unlike his son's, were of a light blue, and hazy both in texture and expression. His hands were long-fingered and tremulous. He gave your hand a sharp squeeze, and the same instant abandoned it with indifference. I soon began to discover in him a tendency to patronize any one who showed him a particle of respect as distinguished from common-place civility. But under all outward appearances it seemed to me that there was a change going on: at least being very willing to believe it, I found nothing to render belief impossible.

He was very fond of the flute his son had given him, and on that sweetest and most expressionless of instruments he played exquisitely.

One evening when I called to see them, Falconer said,

'We are going out of town for a few weeks, Gordon: will you go with us?'

'I am afraid I can't.'

'Why? You have no teaching at present, and your writing you can do as well in the country as in town.'

'That is true; but still I don't see how I can. I am too poor for one thing.'

'Between you and me that is nonsense.'

'Well, I withdraw that,' I said. 'But there is so much to be done, specially as you will be away, and Miss St John is at the Lakes.'

'That is all very true; but you need a change. I have seen for some weeks that you are failing. Mind, it is our best work that He wants, not the dregs of our exhaustion. I hope you are not of the mind of our friend Mr. Watts, the curate of St. Gregory's.'

'I thought you had a high opinion of Mr. Watts,' I returned.

'So I have. I hope it is not necessary to agree with a man in everything before we can have a high opinion of him.'

'Of course not. But what is it you hope I am not of his opinion in?'

'He seems ambitious of killing himself with work--of wearing himself out in the service of his master--and as quickly as possible. A good deal of that kind of thing is a mere holding of the axe to the grindstone, not a lifting of it up against thick trees. Only he won't be convinced till it comes to the helve. I met him the other day; he was looking as white as his surplice. I took upon me to read him a lecture on the holiness of holidays. "I can't leave my poor," he said. "Do you think G.o.d can't do without you?" I asked. "Is he so weak that he cannot spare the help of a weary man? But I think he must prefer quality to quant.i.ty, and for healthy work you must be healthy yourself. How can you be the visible sign of the Christ-present amongst men, if you inhabit an exhausted, irritable brain? Go to G.o.d's infirmary and rest a while. Bring back health from the country to those that cannot go to it. If on the way it be trans.m.u.ted into spiritual forms, so much the better. A little more of G.o.d will make up for a good deal less of you."'

'What did he say to that?'

'He said our Lord died doing the will of his Father. I told him--"Yes, when his time was come, not sooner. Besides, he often avoided both speech and action." "Yes," he answered, "but he could tell when, and we cannot." "Therefore," I rejoined, "you ought to accept your exhaustion as a token that your absence will be the best thing for your people.

If there were no G.o.d, then perhaps you ought to work till you drop down dead--I don't know."'

'Is he gone yet?'

'No. He won't go. I couldn't persuade him.'

'When do you go?'

'To-morrow.'

'I shall be ready, if you really mean it.'

'That's an if worthy only of a courtier. There may be much virtue in an if, as Touchstone says, for the taking up of a quarrel; but that if is bad enough to breed one,' said Falconer, laughing. 'Be at the Paddington Station at noon to-morrow. To tell the whole truth, I want you to help me with my father.'

This last was said at the door as he showed me out.

In the afternoon we were nearing Bristol. It was a lovely day in October. Andrew had been enjoying himself; but it was evidently rather the pleasure of travelling in a first-cla.s.s carriage like a gentleman than any delight in the beauty of heaven and earth. The country was in the rich sombre dress of decay.

'Is it not remarkable,' said my friend to me, 'that the older I grow, I find autumn affecting me the more like spring?'

'I am thankful to say,' interposed Andrew, with a smile in which was mingled a shade of superiority, 'that no change of the seasons ever affects me.'

'Are you sure you are right in being thankful for that, father?' asked his son.

His father gazed at him for a moment, seemed to bethink himself after some feeble fas.h.i.+on or other, and rejoined,

'Well, I must confess I did feel a touch of the rheumatism this morning.'

How I pitied Falconer! Would he ever see of the travail of his soul in this man? But he only smiled a deep sweet smile, and seemed to be thinking divine things in that great head of his.

At Bristol we went on board a small steamer, and at night were landed at a little village on the coast of North Devon. The hotel to which we went was on the steep bank of a tumultuous little river, which tumbled past its foundation of rock, like a troop of watery horses galloping by with ever-dissolving limbs. The elder Falconer retired almost as soon as we had had supper. My friend and I lighted our pipes, and sat by the open window, for although the autumn was so far advanced, the air here was very mild. For some time we only listened to the sound of the waters.

'There are three things,' said Falconer at last, taking his pipe out of his mouth with a smile, 'that give a peculiarly perfect feeling of abandonment: the laughter of a child; a snake lying across a fallen branch; and the rush of a stream like this beneath us, whose only thought is to get to the sea.'

We did not talk much that night, however, but went soon to bed. None of us slept well. We agreed in the morning that the noise of the stream had been too much for us all, and that the place felt close and torpid.