The End Of The Rainbow Part 24

"And you don't mean to tell me you were such a fool as to say he might go?" J. P. Thornton, walking up the hill for the fourth time on the way home from a session meeting with Lawyer Ed, asked the question again in an extremity of indignation.

And Lawyer Ed answered as he had done each time before:

"I couldn't stand in the boy's way, Jack; I just couldn't."

They had argued the question for an hour, up and down the hills between their two homes, and had come to no agreement. That Roderick had had an offer to tempt any young man there was no doubt. A partnership in the firm of Elliot and Kent, solicitors for the British North American Transcontinental Railroad, was such a chance as came the way of few at his age.

And yet Mr. Thornton declared that he should have refused it unconditionally. Not so Lawyer Ed; his generous heart condoned the boy.

"It's the chance of a life-time, Jack," he declared. "It would be shameful to keep him out of it, and, mind you, he wouldn't say he would go until I urged it."

"Oh, blow him!" J. P. was a very dignified gentleman and did not revert to his boyhood's slang except under extreme provocation. "He shouldn't have allowed you to urge him. And what about the brilliant prospect you gave up once just because his father was in need?"

"Well, never mind that," said Lawyer Ed, hurriedly. "He doesn't know anything about that and he's not going to either."

"And it was Bill Graham who wanted you, and you wouldn't go. And now Bill's taking him away from you. He ought to be ashamed!"

"Bill thought he was doing me a kindness. He knew Rod's success is mine."

J. P. was silent from sheer exhaustion of all sane argument. He was grieved and bitterly disappointed for his friend's sake. Ed was in imperative need of a rest and just when life was looking a little easier to him, and the long-deferred holiday was within reach, Roderick was deserting.

If they could only have visited the Holy Land before he left, it would not have seemed so bad. But though Roderick had consented to remain until his chief returned, Lawyer Ed had felt he could not go, for he must busy himself gathering up the threads of his work which he had been dropping with such relief.

Roderick had not come to his final decision without much argument with himself. His head said Go, but he could not quite convince his heart that he was right in leaving Lawyer Ed so soon. He had argued the question with himself during many sleepless nights, but the lure of success had proved the stronger. And he was going late in the autumn to take up his new work.

To Old Angus the news was like the shutting out of the light of day.

Roderick was going away. At first that was all he could comprehend.

But he did not for one moment lose his sublime faith either in his boy or in his G.o.d. The Lord's hand was in it all, he told himself. He was leading the Lad out into larger service and his father must not stand in the way. He said not one word of his own loss, but was deeply concerned over Lawyer Ed's. He was worried lest the Lad's going might mean business difficulties for his friend.

"If the Father will be wanting the Lad, Edward," he said one golden autumn afternoon, when Lawyer Ed stopped at the farm gate in pa.s.sing, "then we must not be putting our little wills in His way. I would not be minding for myself, oh, no, not at all--" the old man's smile was more pathetic than tears. "The dear Lord will be giving me so many children on the Jericho Road, that He feels I can spare Roderick."

Eddie Perkins was stumbling about the lane trying to rake up the dead leaves into neat piles as Angus had instructed him. He came whimpering up with a bruised finger which he held up to the old man. Angus comforted him tenderly, telling him Eddie must be a man and not mind a little scratch. He looked down at this most helpless of his children and gently stroked the boy's misshapen head.

"Yes, He would be very kind, giving me so many of His little ones to care for, and He feels I can spare Roderick. The Lad is strong--" his voice faltered a moment, but he went on bravely.

"But it was you I was thinking of, Edward. I could not but be fearing that you were making a great sacrifice. There is your visit to the Holy Land--and the business. It will be hard for you, Edward?"

Lawyer Ed, seated in his mud-splashed buggy at the gate, turned quickly away, the anxiety in Old Angus's voice was almost too much for his tender heart. There was a wistful plea in it that he should vindicate Roderick from a shadow of suspicion. He jerked his horse's head violently and demanded angrily what in thunder it meant by trying to eat all the gra.s.s off the roadside like a fool of an old cow, and then he rose valiantly to the Lad's defence.

"Hut, tut, Angus!" he cried bl.u.s.teringly. "Such nonsense! You know as well as I do that the Lad didn't want to leave. I fairly drove him away. Pshaw! never mind the Holy Land. We're all journeying to it together, anyway. And as for my business--somebody else'll turn up. I always felt Algonquin would be too small for Rod. You'll see he'll make a name for himself that'll make us all proud."

He did it splendidly, and Angus was comforted. He blamed himself for what he termed his lack of faith in the boy and in his Father. And many a night, as he sat late by his fire, trying to reason himself into cheerful resignation, he recalled Edward's words hopefully. Yes, he surely ought to be proud and glad that the Lad was going out into a wider service. He was leaving him alone, on his Jericho Road, here, but that was only because the Father needed him for a busier highway, where thieves were crueller and more numerous.

As the autumn pa.s.sed and the time for leaving approached, the Lad ran out very often to the farm. His visits were a constantly increasing source of discomfort--both to heart and conscience. His father's gallant attempts at cheerfulness, and his sublime a.s.surance that his son was going away to do a greater work for the Master stung Roderick to the quick. That Master, whom he had long ago left out of his life's plan, had said, "Ye cannot serve G.o.d and Mammon." And from even the little Roderick had seen of the affairs of Elliot and Kent, he knew only too well that to serve that firm and humanity at the same time would be impossible.

There were others who did not possess his father's faith in his purpose, and they spoke to him plainly on the matter. J. P. Thornton, remembering indignantly all that Lawyer Ed had once given up for Old Angus's sake, and further maddened by being forbidden to disclose it, expressed his disapproval of Roderick's leaving so soon, in strong incisive terms.

His remarks succeeded only in angering the young man, and making him more determined in his course. Doctor Leslie was the next to speak plainly on the matter, and his kindly, deep-searching words were harder to set aside. Roderick was pa.s.sing the Manse one day when Mammy Viney hailed him.

"Honey, de minesta' want you," she called, in her soft rich tones.

"An' you'se gwine away, an' leavin' you ole Auntie Kirsty," she said reproachfully, as he came up the steps and shook hands with her.

"But you wouldn't want me to stay and bother Aunt Kirsty in the kitchen all my life, now, would you, Mammy Viney? I thought men were a nuisance there."

"Men's jus' a trouble eberywhar," she said sternly. "Dat Mahogany Bill he was jus' like all de res', an' here you doin' de same, goin' off an'

leabin' folks in de lurch, with all de hard work to do. I'se shame of you--dat I is!"

Roderick laughed good-naturedly, as he followed her into the house, but Mammy Viney tossed her head. "Eberybody say dat it pretty mean o' you, anyhow," she said with the air of one who could tell a great deal if she wished. "'Deed dey's sayin' dat you no business make Lawya Ed stay home!"

Roderick did not wait to hear any more of what Algonquin was saying about him. Mammy Viney rather enjoyed recounting such remarks, and never took one jot or one t.i.ttle from that which she pa.s.sed along.

Doctor Leslie met him at the study door, with outstretched hands. "Now tell me all about this going away scheme," he said; and Roderick told him eagerly, about the brilliant prospects ahead of him, and when he finished there was the implied question in the boy's eyes. Would he not be blind to his and every one's best interests to remain in Algonquin in the face of such inducements?

Doctor Leslie sat and looked out at the orchard trees, with their wealth of red and gold apples falling with soft thuds upon the gra.s.s.

How often had that question come to him in his youth, and when he had examined his own heart and his reasons for obeying the call to go away, he had been compelled to remain.

He saw Roderick's position, and sympathised with the youthful longing to be away and to do great deeds; but he was afraid the way had not yet truly opened up into which Angus McRae's son could step. He had learned, in the year Roderick had spent in Algonquin, that the young man was not vitally interested in the things that are eternal. His outlook on life was not his father's. The minister felt impelled to speak plainly.

"I feel sure," he said slowly, turning his eyes from the garden, and letting them rest kindly upon the boy's frank face, "I feel sure, Roderick, that no young man who lacks ambition will be of much use to the world. But ambition is a dangerous guide alone. If you are anxious to make the best of your life, my boy, the Lord will open the way to great opportunities. But the time and the way will be plainly shown. If this is a door of greater opportunity, then enter it, and G.o.d give you great and large blessing. But if you are leaving with any doubts as to its being the right course, if you fear that there are other obligations you must yet fulfil, then I charge you to examine your heart carefully, lest you fight against G.o.d. It is no use trying to do that. One day or other His love will hedge us about. If it cannot draw us into the way it meets us on the Damascus Road and blinds us with its light. But some of us miss the best of life before that happens. Don't lose the way, Lad; your father instructed you well in it."

For days the warning followed Roderick, tormenting him. He dared not examine his motives carefully, lest he find them false. He was out on life's waters, paddling hard for the gleam of gold, and he had no time to stop and consider whither it was leading him. It might vanish while he lingered.

There was another person whose opinion he was anxious to get on this vexed question. He wondered every waking hour what she would think of his going. Perhaps she didn't think about it at all, he speculated miserably. He still continued to waylay her in Willow Lane, as he went to and from home, and one evening he ran upon his poor rival, Afternoon Tea Willie, doing the same sentinel duty.

Roderick had been home for supper and was returning to the office early to do some left over work, when he overtook him slowly walking towards Algonquin.

"Good evening, Mr. Roderick," he said in a melancholy tone. "May I walk into town with you?"

Roderick slackened his stride to suit the young man. He was rather impatient at having to endure his company, but he soon changed his mind, for Alfred was in a confidential mood.

"I might as well go home," he said gloomily. "She's gone."

"Who's gone?" asked Roderick perversely.

"Why, Miss Murray. She slipped away somehow, and I don't know how she did it. But I've waited down here for her for the last time." He choked for a moment, then continued firmly. "She's showed me plainly she doesn't want me, and I'm too proud to force my company upon her."

Roderick did not know what to say; he wanted to laugh, but it was impossible to keep just a little of the fellow-feeling that makes us wondrous kind from creeping into his heart.

"Well, it's too bad," he said at last. "But if she doesn't want you, of course there is only one thing for you to do."

"I have been faithful to her for a year," said the rejected lover. "I never before was attentive to any lady, no matter how charming, for that length of time, and she needn't have treated me that way."

The subject was the most interesting one in the world to Roderick, and he could not resist encouraging the young man to go on.

And poor Afternoon Tea Willie, unaccustomed to a sympathetic hearing, poured out all his long heartache.

"I am telling you this in strict confidence you know, Roderick," he said. "It is such a relief to tell some one and it seems right I should tell you the end of this sad romance, for you helped me and were kind to me at its very beginning." He paused for a moment, to reflect sadly on his disappointed hopes.