“Don’t hold me, mother,” he said; “I could not run away from you if I would. You think I don’t take my discovery as I ought to do? If it is true,” said Colin, grasping his mother’s hand, “you will have time enough to be miserable about me after; let us be happy as long as we can. But I don’t think it is true. I have died and come alive again. I am not going to die any more just now,” said Colin, with a smile which was more than his mother could bear; and his eyes were so fixed upon her, that her efforts to swallow the climbing sorrow in her throat were such as consumed her strength. But even then it was of him and not herself that she thought. “I wasna meaning--I wasna saying--” she tried to articulate in her broken voice; and then at intervals, “A’ can be borne--a’ can be borne--that doesna go against the will of God. Oh Colin, my ain laddie! we maun a’ die; but we must not rebel against Him,” cried the Mistress. A little more, and even she, though long-enduring as love could make her, must have reached the limits of her strength; but Colin, strangely enough, was no way disposed for solemnity, nor for seriousness. He was at the height of the rebound, and disposed to carry his nurses with him to that smiling mountain-top from which death and sorrow had dispersed like so many mists and clouds.
“Come to the window, and look out,” said Colin; “take my arm, mother; it feels natural to have you on my arm. Look here--there are neither hills nor water, but there are always stars about. I don’t mean to be discouraged,” said the young man. He had to lean against the window to support himself; but, all the same, he supported her, keeping fast hold of the hand on his arm. “I don’t mean to be discouraged,” said Colin, “nor to let you be discouraged. I have been in the valley of the shadow of death, but I have come out again. It does not matter to me what the doctor says, or what Lauderdale says, or any other of my natural enemies. You and I, mother, know better,” he said; “I am not going to die.”
The two stood at the window, looking up to the faint stars, two faces cast in the same mould--one distraught with a struggling of hope against knowledge, against experience; the other radiant with a smile of youth. “I am not quite able to walk over the Alps, at present,” said Colin, leading the Mistress back to her chair; “but, for all that, let us go to Italy since the doctor says so. And, Lauderdale, come out of the dark, and light the candles, and don’t talk any more nonsense. We are going to have a consultation about the ways and means. I don’t know how it is to be done,” said Colin, gaily, “since we have not a penny, nor has anybody belonging to us; but still, since you say so, mother, and the doctor, and Lauderdale----”