“I’m no saying if I’m well or ill,” said Lauderdale; “I’m saying it’s grand for you to leave your friends in a suffering condition, and go off and make up to other folk. It’s well to be off with the old love—for my own part, however,” said Colin’s Mentor, “I’m no for having a great deal to do with women. They’re awfu’ doubtful creatures, you may take my word for it; some seem about as good as the angels—no that I have any personal acquaintance with the angels, but it’s aye an intelligible metaphor—some just as far on the other side. Besides, it’s a poor thing for a man to fritter away what little capability of a true feeling there may be in him. I’ve no fancy for the kind of friendships that are carried on after the manner of flirtations. For my part, I’m a believer in love,” said the philosopher, with a sudden fervour of reproof which brought an unusual amount of colour to his face.
“You are absurd all the same,” said Colin, laughing; “here is no question either of love, or flirtation, or even of friendship. I know what you mean,” he added with a slightly heightened colour; “you think that, having once imagined I admired Miss Frankland, I ought to have continued in the same mind all my life. You don’t appreciate my good sense, Lauderdale; but, at all events, the young lady has nothing to do with my interest here.”
“I was saying nothing about Miss Frankland,” said Lauderdale; “I was making a confession of faith on my own part, which has naething to do with you that I can see. As for the young leddy, as you say, if it doesna begin with her, it’s a’ the more likely to end with her, according to my experience. To be sure, there’s no great amount of time; but a boat like this is provocative of intimacy. You’re aye in the second cabin, which is a kind of safeguard; but, as for your good sense—”
“Don’t associate that poor fellow’s name with anything ridiculous,” said Colin, “but come up on deck, like a reasonable man, and judge for yourself.{215}”
“Ay, ay,” said Lauderdale, slowly; “I understand the kind of thing. I’ve seen it many a day myself. Partly youthfulness, that thinks the thing that is happening to itself more important than anything else in the world; partly a kind of self-regard; partly a wish to take compensation out of the world for what has to be given up. I’m no saying but there’s something better at the bottom, but it’s awfu’ hard to separate the physical and the spiritual. I wouldna say but even you, your own self—but it took a different form with you,” said Lauderdale, stopping short abruptly. Looking at Colin, and seeing that still there was not much bloom on his worn cheeks, it occurred to his careful guardian that it might be as well not to recall the distempered thoughts of the sick-room at Wodensbourne to his patient’s mind too soon.
“I suppose you are right,” said Colin; “it took a different form with me. A more undutiful, unbelieving form; for Meredith makes no question what it means, as I used to do.”
“I’m no so clear of that,” said Lauderdale. “It’s seldom unbelief that asks a reason. I would not say, now I’m on my feet, but what there may be a place known among men by the name of Italy. Come, callant, and let me see if the skies are aught like what they are at hame.”
Everything was changed when Colin and his friend stood again on deck. The calm weather had restored to life the crowd of sea-sick passengers who, like Lauderdale, had, up to this moment, kept themselves and their miseries under cover below. The universal scepticism and doubt of ever being better had given way to a cheerful confidence. Everybody believed—happy in his delusion—that for himself he had mastered the demon, and would be sea-sick no more. Among so many, it was not so easy to distinguish Meredith as Colin had expected; and he had time to discuss several matters with Lauderdale, showing a certain acrid feeling on his side of the question which surprised his interlocutor, before his new friends appeared. Colin had taken his second-class berth gladly enough, without thinking of any drawback; but, when he saw the limit clearly before his eyes, and perceived within reach, and indeed within hearing, the little “society” which he was not able to join, the fact of this momentary inferiority chafed him a little. Like most other people, he had a dislike to the second place—not that he cared about society, as he took pains to convince himself. But the truth was, that Colin did care for society, and, though too proud to confess such a thought, even to himself, secretly longed to{216} join those new groups which were gradually growing into acquaintance before his eyes.
When he saw the two figures approaching which had attracted him so strongly on the previous night, his heart gave a little jump, though his eyes were fixed in another direction. They were not only two curious human creatures whom it was hard to comprehend, but, at the same time, they represented the world to Colin, who was at this present moment shut out from intercourse with everybody but Lauderdale, whose manner of musing he knew by heart. He did not look round, but he heard the footsteps approaching, and would have been equally disappointed and irritated had they turned back. This danger, however, speedily terminated. Meredith came up hastily, drawing along with him, as usual, the sister who had not any being except in him, and laid his thin hand on Colin’s shoulder. The sunshine and the brightened skies did not change the strain of the young preacher’s thoughts. He laid his hand on Colin, pressing the young man’s shoulder with an emphatic touch. “We meet again in the land of living men, in the place of hope,” he said, turning his sister with him as he turned. She clung to him so closely that they moved like one, without any apparent volition on her part; and even Colin’s salutation seemed to disturb her, as if it had been something unnecessary and unexpected. Her little hurried bow, her lips that just parted in an anxious momentary smile, had a certain surprise in them; and there was even a little impatience, as if she had said, “Answer him; why should you mind me?” in the turn of her head.
“Yes, we meet on a bright morning, which looks like life and hope,” said Colin; “and everybody seems disposed to enjoy it; even my friend here, who has been helpless since we started, has come to life at last.”
Thus directed, Meredith’s eager eyes turned to Lauderdale, upon whom they paused with their usual solemn inquiring look. “I hope he has come to life in a higher sense,” said the sick man, who thought it his duty to speak in season and out of season; “but for that true life, existence is only the payment of a terrible penalty. I hope, like you, he has thought on the great subject.”
When he stopped short, and looked straight in Lauderdale’s face, there was a wonderful silence over the little group. The dying prophet said nothing more, but looked down, awful and abstracted, from the heights of death on which he was standing, to receive an answer, which Lauderdale was too much taken by{217} surprise, and Colin too much alarmed for the result of the inquiry, to give at once.
“I’ve thought on an awfu’ quantity of subjects,” said Lauderdale, after a moment; “a hundred or two more than can have gone through your mind at your age; and I’m no averse to unfolding my experiences, as this callant will tell you,” he added, with a smile, which, however, was lost upon his questioner.
“Your experiences!” said Meredith. He put his thin arm eagerly, before any one was aware what he intended to do, through Lauderdale’s arm. “I frighten and horrify many,” said the invalid, not without a gleam of satisfaction; “but there are so few, so miserably few, with whom it is possible to have true communion. Let me share your experiences—there must be instruction in them.”
The philosopher, thus seized, made a comical grimace, unseen by anybody but Colin; but the sick man was far too much in earnest to observe any reluctance on the part of his new acquaintance, and Lauderdale submitted to be swept on in the strange wind of haste and anxiety and eagerness which surrounded the dying youth, to whom a world lying in wickedness, and “I, I alone” left to maintain the knowledge of God among men, was the one great truth. There was not much room to move about upon the deck; and, as Meredith turned and went on, with his arm in Lauderdale’s, his sister, who was sharply turned round also by his movement, found it hard enough to maintain her position by his side. Though he was more attached to her than to any other living creature, it was not his habit, as it might have been in happier circumstances, to care for her comfort, or to concern himself about her personal convenience. He swept her along with him over the hampered deck, through passages which were barely wide enough for two, but through which she crushed herself as long as possible, catching her dress on all the corners, and losing her breath in the effort. As for Colin, he found himself left behind with a half-amazed, half-mortified sensation.
Not his the form, not his the eye,
That youthful maidens wont to fly;
and though he was not truly open to Lauderdale’s jibe concerning flirtations, the very name of that agreeable but dangerous amusement had roused him into making the discovery that Meredith’s sister was very pretty, and that there was something extremely interesting in the rapt devotion to her brother, which at first had prevented him from observing her. It seemed only{218} natural that, when the sick man seized upon Lauderdale, the young lady should have fallen to Colin’s share; and he kept standing............