'As far as the east is distant from the west.' 'And plenteous redemption is ever found with him.'""But, do you think," said Hughie, in a low voice, "God will tell all our sins? Will he make them known?""God forbid!" cried the old man. "'And their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.' 'The depths of the sea.' No, no, boy, he will surely forget, and he will not be proclaiming them."It was a strange picture. The old man leaning upon the top of his hoe looking over at the lad, the gloom of his face irradiated with a momentary gleam of hope, and the boy looking back at him with almost breathless eagerness.
"It would be great," said Hughie, at last, "if he would forget.""Yes," said the old man, the gleam in his face growing brighter, "'If we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us,'
and forgiving with him is forgetting. Ah, yes, it is a great gospel," he continued, and standing there he lifted up his hand and broke into a kind of chant in Gaelic, of which Hughie could catch no meaning, but the exalted look on the old man's face was translation enough.
"Must we always tell?" said Hughie, after the old man had ceased.
"What are you saying, laddie?"
"I say must we always tell our sins--I mean to people?"The old man thought a moment. "It is not always good to be talking about our sins to people. That is for God to hear. But we must be ready to make right what is wrong.""Yes, yes," said Hughie, eagerly, "of course one would be glad to do that."The old man gave him one keen glance, and began hoeing again.
"Ye'd better be asking ye're mother about that. She will know.""No, no," said Hughie, "I can't."The old man paused in his work, looked at the boy for a moment or two, and then went on working again.
"Speak to my woman," he said, after a few strokes of his hoe.
"She's a wonderful wise woman." And Hughie wished that he dared.
During the days of the planting they became great friends, and to their mutual good. The mother's keen eyes noted the change both in Hughie and in her husband, and was glad for it. It was she that suggested to Billy Jack that he needed help in the back pasture with the stones. Billy Jack, quick to take her meaning, eagerly insisted that help he must have, indeed he could not get on with the plowing unless the stones were taken off. And so it came that Hughie and the old man, with old Fly hitched up in the stone-boat, spent two happy and not unprofitable days in the back pasture.
Gravely they discussed the high themes of God's sovereignty and man's freedom, with all their practical issues upon conduct and destiny. Only once, and that very shyly, did the old man bring round the talk to the subject of their first conversation that meant so much to them both.
"The Lord will not be wanting to shame us beyond what is necessary," he said. "There are certain sins which he will bring to light, but there are those that, in his mercy, he permits us to hide; provided always," he added, with emphasis, "we are done with them.""Yes, indeed," assented Hughie, eagerly, "and who wouldn't be done with them?"But the old man shook his head sadly.
"If that were always true a man would soon be rid of his evil heart. But," he continued, as if eager to turn the conversation, "you will be talking with my woman about it. She's a wonderful wise woman, yon."Somehow the opportunity came to Hughie to take the old man's advice. On Saturday evening, just before leaving for home, he found himself alone with Mrs. Finch sitting beside the open window, watching the sun go down behind the trees.
"What a splendid sunset!" he cried. He was ever sensitive to the majestic drama of nature.
"Ay," said Mrs. Finch, "the clouds and the sun make wonderful beauty together, but without the sun the clouds are ugly things.
Hughie quickly took her meaning.
"They are not pleasant," he said.
