“Jean, Jean, where have you been? What is the matter?” “I have been meeting Quintin,” she said, with a bright and heavenly look; “he has been telling me how he loves me.” CHAPTER XXVI. JEAN GEMMELL’S BARGAIN WITH GOD. Yet more grimly bitter than the day of December the thirtieth fell the night. I wandered by the bank of the river, where the sedges rustled lonely and dry by the marge, whispering and chuckling to each other that a forlorn, broken man was passing by. A “smurr” of rain had begun to fall at the hour of dusk, and the slight ice of the morning had long since broken up. The water lisped and sobbed as the wind of winter lapped at the ripples, and the peat-brew of the hills took its sluggish way to the sea. Over against me, set on its hill, I saw the lighted windows of the kirk of Crossmichael. Well I knew what that meant. Mine enemies were sitting there in conclave. They would not rise till I was no more minister of the Kirk of Scotland. They would thrust me out, and whither should I go? To what folk could I minister--an it were not, like Alexander-Jonita, to the wild beasts of the hills? A day before I should have been elated at the thought. But now, for the first time, I saw myself unworthy. Who was I, that thought so highly of myself, that I should appoint me Standard Bearer of the noble banner of the Covenants. A man weak as other men! Nay, infinitely weaker and worse. The meanest hind who worked in the fields to bring home four silver shillings a week to his wife and bairns was better than I. A Standard Bearer! I laughed now at the thought, and the rushes by the water’s edges chuckled and sneered in answering derision. A Standard Bearer, God wot! Renegade and traitor, rather; a man who could not keep his plain vows, whose erring and wandering heart went after vanities; one that had broken a maiden’s heart--unwitting and unintending, did he pretend? Faugh! that was what every Lovelace alleged as his excuse. I had thought myself worthy to do battle for the purity of the Kirk of my fathers. I had pretended that her independence, her position and her power were dearer than life to me. I saw it all now. It was mine own place and position I had been warring for. Also had I not set myself above my brethren? Had I not said, “Get far from me, for am I not holier than thou?” And God, who does not pay His wages on Saturday night, had waited. So now He came to me and said, “Who art thou, Quintin MacClellan, that thou shouldst dare to touch the ark of God?” And as I looked across the dark waters I saw the light burn clearer and clearer in the kirk of Crossmichael. They were lighting more candles that they might see the better to make an end.