by night as well as by day, and the child got bravely through it all.
Allison made a couch of her high kitchen-dresser, when it could be done
without interfering with the work of the moment, and Marjorie lay there
for hours among her pillows, as content as if she had been with her
mother in the parlour.

It was good for the child to have such constant and loving care, and it
was good for Allison to give it.  For many a word of childish wisdom did
she get to think about, and sometimes foolish words to smile at, and in
listening to Marjorie, and caring for her comfort at all times, she
forgot for a while to think of her own cares.

In the long evenings, when the rain or the darkness prevented the usual
run, after the next day's lessons had been prepared, the elder boys used
to betake themselves to the kitchen fireside, and on most such nights
some of their companions found their way there also.  Then there was
story-telling, or the singing of songs and ballads, or endless
discussions about all things under the sun.  Now and then there was a
turn of rather rough play, but it never went very far, for the sound of
their father's step, or a glimpse of their mother's face at the door,
made all quiet again, at least for a time.

They were rather rough lads some of those who came, but they were mostly
"laddies weel brocht up," and rarely was there a word uttered among them
which it would have harmed the youngest child to hear.  There was Scotch
of the broadest in their songs and in their talk, and the manse boys,
who were expected to speak English in the presence of their father and
mother, among their companions made the most of their opportunities for
the use of their own more expressive tongue.  But there was no vulgarity
or coarseness in their talk.

As silent here as elsewhere, the presence of "the new lass," as the
visitors, long accustomed to old Kirstin, called her, did not interfere
in the least with the order of things.  She might have been blind or
deaf for all the difference it made to them, and, except on the rare
occasions when little Marjorie was permitted to be there, for all the
difference their coming made to her.  When Marjorie was there, Allison's
wheel, or the stocking she was knitting, was put aside, and the child
rested at ease and content in her arms.  No one of them all took more
pleasure at such times than Marjorie.  She liked the stories and the
songs and the quaint old ballads, of which Robin and some of the others
had a store, and she was a sympathetic little creature, and could not be
happy unless Allie enjoyed them also, so her attention was never allowed
to wander when the child's hand could touch her cheek.

But better than either song or story, Marjorie liked to hear about all
that was going on in the town.  Nothing came amiss to her that any one
had to tell.  She liked to hear about their neighbours, and the bairns,
their goings and comings, their sickness and recovery.  Even their new
gowns and their visits to one another interested the friendly little
child, who could not visit herself, nor wear new gowns, and the lad who
had the most to say about them all was the one who pleased her best.
All they used to tell her made her a little sad sometimes, for she could
not come and go, or run and play, as those happy children could, and her
chief desire was to be strong and well and "to go about on her own feet
like other folk."

January was nearly over before there came any frost to speak of, and the
first bright, sharp weather, it was said, did much good to the sick folk
in the town.  Then they had snow--not just a shower to excite first
expectation and then disappointment among the lads and lassies who
rejoiced in its coming, as they mostly delighted in any change that
came--but a heavy fall, and then a high wind which drifted it here and
there between the hills and made some of the roads impassable for the
time.  Many of the lanes were filled full, and some of the folk had to
be dug out, because the snow had covered their doors.

There was no end to the great balls which were rolled along the streets.
A strong fort was built on the square beside the pump, which was
fiercely attacked and bravely defended, and battles were fought through
all the streets before the snow was trodden into black slush beneath the
feet of the combatants.  Even the dreaded "kink-hoast" (whooping-cough)
failed to keep some of the bolder spirits out of the fray, and those of
them who took the fun in moderation were none the worse, but rather the
better for the rally.

But Marjorie saw none of this, and she longed to see it all; and though
she had been less ill with the cough than some of the others had been,
she lost ground now, refused her food, and grew fretful and listless as
Allison had never seen her before.

It was hard for the eager little creature to listen quietly to all her
brothers had to tell of what was going on among the young folk of the
town.  They boasted of Robin's strength and skill, and of Jack's
unequalled prowess when "snawba'ing" was the order of the day, and she
wanted to see it all.  And she longed to see the rush of the full burn
and the whiteness of all the hills.  Allison looked at her with a great
longing to comfort her, but what could she say?  Even the mother thought
it wisest to listen in silence to the child's murmurs.

"But it's no' just the snawba'ing and the white hills I am thinking
about, mother.  This is the way it will ay be, all my life long.  I must
just sit still and hear the sound of things, and never be in the midst
of them like other folk.  All my life, mother!  Think of it!"

"My dear," said her mother gravely, "all your life may not be a very
long time."

"But, mother, I would like it to be long.  There is Robin going to be a
great scholar and astonish the whole world; and Jack is going in search
of adventures; and Davie's going to America to have a farm of a thousand
acres, all his own.  And why should I have to stay here, and not even
see the snawba'ing, nor the full burn, nor the castle that the boys
made?"

As a general thing Mrs Hume left her little daughter's "why"
unanswered, only trying to beguile her from such thoughts to the
enjoyment of what was left to her in her quiet life.  To-day her heart
was sore for the child, knowing well that her lot would not seem more
easy to bear as the years went on.

"My darling," said she, "it is God's will."

"Yes, mother; but why should it be God's will just with me?  Surely when
He can do _anything_, He might give me a chance with the rest.  Or else
He should just make me content as I am."

"And so He will, dear, in time.  You must ask Him, and leave all in His
hand."

"Oh! yes.  I must just leave it.  There is nothing else to do.  As to
asking--I ay ask to be made strong, and to walk about on my ain feet.
And then--wouldna I just serve Him!"

The last words were spoken to Allison, whose kind, sad eyes had been
resting on her all the time.  And Allison answered:

"But surely it may be His will that you should see the full burn and the
snawy braes, if it be your mother's will!  A' the bairns are better
since the frost came, and I might carry wee Marjorie as far as the fit
o' the Wind Hill for a change."

"Oh! mother! mother!  Let me go.  Allie carries me so strong and easy.
And I might have Mrs Esselmont's warm shawl round me, and the soft
little hat, and I would never feel the cold.  Oh! mother! mother!"

"I might at least take her to the end o' the lane; and if she should be
cauld, or weary, or if the cough came on, I could be hame with her in a
minute."

Though only half convinced of the wisdom of such a plan, her mother
consented; and by and by the happy child, wrapped warmly, her pale face
looking very bright and sweet in the soft little hat, laid herself back
in Allison's arms with a sigh of content.

"Yes, I'm going to heed what Robin says, and fall into raptures and
weary myself.  I'm just going to be quiet and see it all, and then I
will have it all to think about afterward."

The snow was all trodden down in the street through which they passed
first, to see the snow castle which the boys had made, and the castle
itself was a disappointment.  It was "past its best," Allison said.  It
was battered and bulging, and the walls had lost their whiteness; and
the snow about it was trampled and soiled, and little pools of dirty
water had collected at its base.  But even "at its best," it must have
fallen far short of the beauty of the castle which the child's
imagination had built, as she lay in the dark, wishing so eagerly to be
like the rest.

But the rush of the full burn did not disappoint her, nor the long level
fields, nor the hills beyond.  The only blink of sunshine which came
that day rested on them as they crossed the foot-bridge and came into
the broken path which led to the farm of Wind Hill.  A hedge bordered
the near fields, and a few trees rose up bare and black on the hillside;
and all the rest of the land, as far as they could see, lay in unsullied
whiteness.

"A clean, clean world!" said Marjorie.  "It looks like a strange
country.  It's bonny; but I think I like the green grass best, and the
gowans."

"Weel, ye may take a good look o' it this day, for it winna lie long
clean and white like this," said Allison, as a soft warm wind met them
as they turned.  They went up and down where the snow lay lightest, and
then crossed the burn at the end of the green.

"Are you sure ye're nae cauld?" said Allison.

"That I am not.  And, Allie, I havena given a cough since I came out."

"But we'll need to gae hame now.  If we dinna make your mother anxious
this time, she will be the readier to let us take another turn some fine
day."

Marjorie's face fell for an instant.

"No, Allie, I'm no' going to be fractious.  But we might just look in
and ask for Mrs Beaton, as we are so near.  And Robin says John is
coming home, and we might ask about it."

But Allison shook her head.

"We got no leave to go and see anybody.  And if we take the street we'll
hae twa or three idle folk glowerin' an' speerin' this and that at us.
I like the bonny quiet lane best."

Marjorie's shrill laugh rang out at that.

"Are ye feared at the folk, Allie?  They ay mean it for kindness.  But I
like the lane, too.  And maybe my mother will let us come and see Mrs
Beaton next time."

The end of Mrs Beaton's house skirted the green, and so did the narrow
strip of garden which was behind it.  The road home was as short the one
way as the other.  If they crossed the green toward the right it took
them to the street, and if they turned the other way they took the path
behind the gardens, or rather the kail-yards of the houses on the
street.  Before they entered this path they turned to take a last look
of the long, snowy slope of the hills with the sunshine on them.

"The snow is pleasanter just to look at than to wade about in," said
Allison.

"But, Allison, that is because ye dinna ken.  O!  I would like weel to
wade about in it, as the other bairns do."

"O!  I ken fine what it is like.  I have been in far deeper snaw whiles,
following the sheep--"

"Have ye, Allie?  But ye dinna ken what it would be like never to have
put your foot in the snaw all your life.  Think of that, Allie.  But
never mind.  Tell me about following the sheep through the drifts."

But the shadow, which the child had learned to know, had fallen on
Allison's face, and she answered nothing.

"Never mind, Allie dear, I'll tell you something.  Do ye ken what that
little housie is?  It has neither door nor window.  There is a hole on
this side that is shut with a board.  But it is a nice place.  I have
been in it whiles.  That is the place where John Beaton makes headstones
when he's no' away building houses on the other side of Aberdeen."

"Do ye mean stanes for the kirkyard?"

"Just that.  He's a clever lad, John.  He can do many things, Robin
says.  He's Robin's friend."

"It maun be dreary wark."

"But that wouldna trouble John.  He's strong and cheerful, and I like
him weel.  He's wise, and he's kind.  He tells me about folk that he has
seen, and places and things.  And whiles he sings to me, and I like him
best after my father and mother and my brothers--and you," added
Marjorie, glancing up at Allison.  "I'm no' sure which o' the two I like
best.  I'll ken better when I see you together.  Ye're the bonniest
far!" said the child, fondly patting the cheek, to which the soft wind
blowing upon it had brought a splendid colour.  "Did Mrs Beaton never
tell you about `My John'?"

"Oh! ay.  But I dinna mind about it.  I wasna heedin'."

"But ye'll like him when ye see him," said Marjorie.

The mother was watching for them when they reached home, and Robin was
there too.  It was Robin who took the child from Allison and carried her
in.

"Oh, mother!  I have been over the burn, and I've seen the hills all
covered with snow and the sun shining on them, and it was beautiful.
And I'm not just so very tired.  Are ye tired, Allie?"

"What would tire me?  I would like to carry ye ilka (every) day to the
top o' Win'hill.  It might do ye good."

Robin had never heard Allison say so many words at a time before.

"It has done Allie good, at any rate," said he as he seated himself by
the parlour fire and began to take off his little sister's wraps.  Then
he took off her shoes and stockings "to warm her bonny wee footies," as
he said.

"Has it done her good?  I'm glad o' that," said Marjorie, "for Allie has
had sore trouble, I'm nearly sure.  She forgets me whiles, even when she
has me in her arms, and her face changes, and her een look as if she
were seein' things no' there."

"My dear!" said her mother.  "It might vex Allie for you to be watching
her face, and speaking about it, since she has never said a word about
her troubles to you."

"Oh, mother!  It is only to you and Robin.  Do you think I would speak
about my Allie to other folk?" and the tears came into the child's eyes.

"Now, Maysie," said her brother, "when ye begin to look like that, I ay
ken that ye're tired and likely to grow fractious and ill to do with.
So you must just lie still in my arms, and I'll sing ye to sleep.  What
shall I sing?  The _Lass o' Glenshee_? or _The Lord's my Shepherd_?"

It was not long before the child was sleeping sweetly on her little
couch, nor did the flush which her mother so dreaded to see, and which
too often followed any unusual excitement, come to her cheeks as she
slept.  She slept well at night also, and nothing could be clearer than
that the long walk had done her no harm, but good.

So, a precedent being established, Marjorie had many a walk after that.

Sometimes she was allowed to spend an hour with Mrs Beaton, or auld
Maggie, or some other friend, and at such times Allison would leave her
and return for her again.  It cannot be said that her limbs grew much
stronger, or that the dull pain in the weary little back troubled her no
more.  But the change gave her new thoughts and new interests, and
rested her when she grew weary of her doll, and her books, and of the
quiet of the parlour, and sometimes even of her mother's company.

But when the days grew long and warm, there were even better things in
store for her, and for Allison also, through her tender care of the
child.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

  "The spring cam' o'er the Westlin hill,
  And the frost it fled awa',
  And the green grass lookit smilin' up
  Nane the waur for a' the snaw."

The winter had been so long in coming and so moist and mild when it
came, that weatherwise folk foretold a spring late and cold as sure to
follow.  But for once they were all mistaken.  Whatever might come
later, there came, when April had fairly set in, several days which
would have done credit to June itself, and on one of these days the
schoolmistress made up her mind that she would go down to the manse and
speak to the minister's wife about the bairns.

She was standing at her own door, looking out over the hills, which were
showing some signs of coming summer.  So were the birch-trees in the
distance, and the one laburnum which stood in a corner of Mistress
Beaton's garden.  She sighed as she gazed.

"The simmer will soon be here, and it'll soon be over again.  It's but a
blink noo," she said to herself, "but if the morn is like this day,
we'll mak' the best o' it.  I'se hae the bairns up to the Stanin'
Stanes.  The wind there will blaw awa' what's left o' the kink-hoast
among them.  They'll be a' keen eneuch to get there for the sake o' the
ploy, and if they're weel eneuch for the like o' that, their mithers
will hardly hae the face to keep them langer frae the school.  And it is
high time they were comin' back again," added she, thinking less,
perhaps, of their loss of lore than of the additional penny a week which
each returning one would bring to her limited housekeeping.

She was a tall, gaunt woman, with a wrinkled, unhappy-looking face and
weary eyes.  Her grey hair showed a little under the mob cap, closely
bound round her head with a broad, black ribbon, and her spectacles,
tied with a string for safety, rested high on her furrowed forehead.
She wore the usual petticoat of dark winsey, and her short gown of some
dark-striped print fell a little below the knee.  A large cotton
kerchief was spread over her shoulders and fastened snugly across her
breast.  Her garments were worn and faded, but perfectly neat and clean,
and she looked, as she was, a decent, but not very cheery old woman.
She had an uncertain temper, her friends allowed, and even those who
were not so friendly acknowledged that "her lang warstle wi' the bairns
o' twa generations, to say nothing of other troubles that had fallen to
her lot, might weel account for, and even excuse that."

She turned into the house at last, and began gathering together the
dog-eared Bibles and Testaments, and the tattered catechisms, and
"Proverbs of Solomon," which were the only books approved or used in her
school, and placed them in a wooden tray by the door.  She gave a brief
examination to the stockings which the lassies had been knitting in the
afternoon, muttering and shaking her head as she held them up to the
light.  The mistakes in some of them she set right, and from some of
them she pulled out the "wires," sticking them into the balls of
worsted, with some anticipatory pleasure at the thought of the
consternation of the "careless hizzies" to whom they belonged.

Then the forms were set back, and "the tawse," a firm belt of leather,
cut into strips at one end--by no means the least important of the
educational helps of the time and place--was hung in its usual
conspicuous position, and then the school-room, which was also the whole
house, was supposed to be in order for the night.

It was a dismal little place, having a small window on the side next the
street, and a still smaller one on the other.  There was the inevitable
box-bed on the side opposite the fireplace, and the equally inevitable
big brown chest for clothing, and bedding, and all other household
valuables that needed a touch of "the smith's fingers" for safety.
There was the meal-chest, and a tiny cupboard for dishes and food, and
on a high dresser, suggestive of more extensive housekeeping operations
than the mistress had needed for many a year and day, were piled a
number of chairs and other articles not needed in the school.

A dismal place, but it was her own, till morning should bring the bairns
again.  So she mended the peat fire into a brighter glow, and seated
herself beside it, to take the solace of her pipe, after the worries and
weariness of the day.

A pleasant sound put an end to her meditations.  From under the chair
which stood near the little window at the head of the box-bed, came,
with stately step, a big, black hen, announcing, with triumphant cackle,
that _her_ duty was done for the day also.  The mistress rose and took
the warm egg from the nest.

"Weel dane, Tappie!  Ye'se get your supper as ye deserve, and then I
maun awa' to the manse."  So she scattered her scanty supply of crumbs
about the door, and then prepared herself for her visit.

If she had been going to the manse by special invitation, she would have
put on her Sabbath-day's gown and shawl, and all the folk would have
known it as she went up the street.  But as she was going on business,
she only changed her mutch, and her kerchief and apron, and putting her
key in its accustomed hole in the thatch, she went slowly down the
street, knitting, or, as she would have called it, "weaving," as she
went.

She had not very far to go, but two or three greetings she got and
returned as she passed.  "Mistress Jamieson," the neighbours called her
to her face, but she knew quite well that behind her back she was just
called Bell Cummin, her maiden name, as was the way among the humbler
class of folk in these parts.  They all paid her a certain measure of
respect, but she was not a favourite among them, for she was silent and
sour, and sometimes over-ready to take offence, and her manner was not
over-friendly at the best of times.

At the entrance of the close which led to the back door of the manse
stood the weaver's wife from next door, and with her a woman with whom
the mistress was not always on speaking terms.  This was the wife of
tailor Coats, who spent, as the schoolmistress had once told her, more
time on the causey (pavement) than was good either for herself or her
bairns.  She would fain have passed her now without speaking, but that
was not the intention of Mistress Coats.

"The minister's nae at hame, nor the mistress," said she, "and since ye
hae lost your journey, ye micht as weel come in and hae a crack (talk)
with Mistress Sim and me, and gie's o' your news."

"I dinna deal in news, and I hae nae time for cracks and clavers."

"Dear me! and sae few bairns as ye hae noo at the schule.  Gin ye could
but learn them their samplers noo, or even just plain sewing, ye might
keep the lassies thegither for a whilie langer.  But their mithers man
hae them taucht to use their needles, and it canna be wonnered at."

This was a sore subject with the mistress, who was no needle-woman, and
she turned, ready with a sharp answer.  But the smile on the woman's
face, and the look of expectation on the more friendly face of Mistress
Sim, served as a warning, and calling her discretion to her help, she
turned at once into the manse.

It was peaceful enough there.  No one was in the kitchen, and after a
moment's hesitation she crossed the little passage and knocked at the
parlour-door.  No response being given, she pushed it gently open and
looked into the room.  The two youngest boys were amusing themselves
with their playthings in a corner, and Marjorie lay on her couch with
her doll and her doll's wardrobe, and a book or two within reach of her
hand.  The tiny little face brightened at the sight of the mistress.

"Come away in, Mistress Jamieson.  I am very glad to see you," said she,
with a tone and manner so exactly like what her mother's might have
been, that the mistress could not but smile a little with amusement as
well as with pleasure.  "My father and mother are both away from home
to-day; but they will soon be back now, and you'll just bide till they
come, will you not?"

Mistress Jamieson acknowledged herself to be in no special haste, and
sitting down, she made advances toward an interchange of greetings with
the little boys.  Wee Wattie, not quite four years old, came forward
boldly enough, and submitted to be lifted to her knee.  But Norman, aged
five, had been once or twice sent to the school, with his brothers, when
his absence was convenient at home, and certain unpleasant recollections
of such times made him a little shy of meeting her friendly advances.
Even Robin and Jack had been in their day afraid of the mistress and her
tawse.  But Marjorie had never been at the school, and had always seen
her in her best mood in the manse parlour.  She had had rather a dull
afternoon with but her little brothers for company, for Allie was busy,
and had only looked in now and then to see that the little ones had got
into no mischief.  So the child was truly pleased to see the mistress,
and showed it; and so Mistress Jamieson was pleased, also, and in the
best of humour for the afternoon.

And this was a fortunate thing for Marjorie.  For she had many questions
in her mind which no one could answer so well as the mistress--questions
about the reading of one child and of the "weaving" of another, and of
the well-doing or ill-doing of many besides.  For though she did not see
the bairns of the town very often, she knew them all, and took great
interest in all that concerned them.

She knew some things about the bairns of the school which the mistress
did not know herself, and which, on the whole, it was as well she should
not know.  So when, in the case of one of them, they seemed to be
approaching dangerous ground, and Mrs Jamieson's face began to lengthen
and to take the set, which to Marjorie, who had only heard about it,
looked ominous of trouble to some one, the child turned the talk toward
other matters.

"I must show you my stocking," said she, opening a basket which stood
within reach of her hand.  "It is not done so ill for a beginner, my
mother says.  But it is slow work.  I like the flowering of muslin
better, but mother says too much of it is no' good for the een.  And it
is quite proper that every one should ken how to make stockings,
especially one with so many brothers as I have."

The stocking was duly examined and admired.  It had been the work of
months, done in "stents" of six or eight times round in a day, and it
was well done "for a beginner."  There were no mended botches, and no
traces of "hanging hairs and holey pies," which so often vexed the very
heart of the mistress in the work of some of the "careless hizzies" whom
she was trying to teach.  She praised it highly, but she looked at the
child and wondered whether she would live to finish it.  There was no
such thought in the mind of Marjorie.

"Mother says that making stockings becomes a pleasant and easy kind of
work when one grows old.  And though I canna just say that I like it
very well.  I must try and get on with it, for it is one of the things
that must be learned young, ye ken."

"Ay, that's true.  And what folk can do weel, they ay come to like to do
in course o' time," said the mistress encouragingly.  "I only wish that
Annie Cairns and Jeannie Robb could show work as weel done."

"Oh! but they are different," said the child, a sudden shadow falling on
her face.  "If I could run about as they can, I would maybe no' care
about other things."

"Puir wee lammie!" said the mistress.

"Oh! but I'm better than I used to be," said Marjorie, eagerly; "a great
deal better.  And I'll maybe be well and strong some day, our Allie
says."

"God grant it, my dear," said the mistress reverently.

"And I have some things to enjoy that the other bairns havena.  See, I
have gotten a fine new book here," said Marjorie, mindful of her
mother's warning about speaking much of her trouble to other folk.
"It's a book my father brought home to my mother the last time he was
away.  I might read a bit of it to you."

"Ay, do ye that.  I will like weel to hear you."

It was "The Course of Time," a comparatively new book in those days, and
one would think a dreary enough one for a child.  It was a grand book to
listen to, when her mother read it to her father, Marjorie thought, and
she liked the sound of some of it even when she read it to herself.  And
it was the sound of it that the mistress liked as she listened, at least
she was not thinking of the sense, but of the ease and readiness with
which the long words glided from the child's lips.  It was about "the
sceptic" that she was reading--the man who had striven to make this fair
and lovely earth.

"A cold and fatherless, forsaken thing that wandered on forlorn,
undestined, unaccompanied, unupheld"; and the mistress had a secret fear
that if the child should stumble among the long words and ask for help,
she might not be able to give it without consideration.

"Ay, it has a fine sound," said she, as Marjorie made a pause.  "But I
wad ken better how ye're comin' on wi' your readin' gin ye were to tak'
the New Testament."

There was a tradition among the old scholars that, in the early days of
her experience as a teacher, the mistress used to make a little pause
before committing herself in the utterance of some of the long words in
the Bible; if it were so, that time was long past.  But before Marjorie
had opened the book, Allison came in, to mend the fire and put things to
rights; and as the books had only been intended as a diversion from
unpleasant possibilities, they were gladly and quickly put aside.

"This is our Allie, mistress," said Marjorie, putting out her hand to
detain her friend as she passed.

"Ay, ay.  I ken that.  I hae seen her at the kirk and elsewhere," said
the mistress, rather stiffly.

"And she is so strong and kind," said the child, laying her cheek on the
hand that had been put forth to smooth her pillow, which had fallen
aside.

Mistress Jamieson had seen "the new lass" often, but she had never seen
on her face the look that came on it at the loving movement of the
child.

"Are ye wearyin' for your tea, dear?  It's late, and I doubt they needed
to go on all the way to Slapp, as they thought they might, and maybe
they winna be home this while."

A shadow fell on the face of the child.  Allison regarded her gravely.

"Never heed, my lammie.  I'll take the wee laddies into the kitchen, and
ye can make tea for the mistress and your brothers if they come in.
You'll like that, dear."

Marjorie brightened wonderfully.  She ay liked what made her think she
was able to do as other folk did.  The mistress rose, excusing herself
for having been beguiled into staying so long.

"And what would my mistress say if we were to let ye away without your
tea?" asked Allison, with great respect and gravity.

Then Robin came in, and he added his word, and to tell the truth the
mistress was well pleased to be persuaded.  She and Robin were on the
friendliest terms now, though there had been "many a tulzie" between
them in the old days.  For Robin, though quieter than Jack, and having
the reputation of being "a douce and sensible laddie" elsewhere, had
been, during the last days of his subjection to Mistress Jamieson, "as
fou o' mischief as an egg is fou o' meat," and she had been glad enough
to see the last of him as a scholar.  But all that had been long
forgotten and forgiven.  Robin behaved to her with the greatest respect
and consideration, "now that he had gotten some sense," and doubtless
when he should distinguish himself in college, as he meant to do, the
mistress would take some of the credit of his success to herself, and
would hold him up as an example to his brothers as persistently as she
had once held him up as a warning.

To-night they were more than friendly, and did not fall out of
conversation of the most edifying sort, Marjorie putting in her word now
and then.  All went well till wee Wattie took a fit of coughing, and
Norman followed in turn; and then Mistress Jamieson told them of her
proposed expedition to the Stanin' Stanes, for the benefit of all the
bairns, if the day should prove fine.

Marjorie leaned back in her chair, clasping her hands and looking at her
brother with eager entreaty in her eyes.  But Robin would not meet her
look.  For Marjorie had a way of taking encouragement to hope for the
attainment of impossible things when no encouragement was intended, and
then when nothing came of it, her disappointment was as deep as her
hopes had been high.

Then she turned her eyes to the mistress, but resisted the impulse to
speak.  She knew that her words would be sympathetic and encouraging,
but that it must end in words as far as she was concerned.

"And it's ay best to go straight to my mother," said Marjorie to
herself, remembering past experiences; "and there will be time enough to
speak in the morning if the day should be fine."

So she wisely put the thought of the morrow away, and took the good of
the present.  And she had her reward.  Warned by Robin, Allie said not a
word of what awaited the school bairns next day, though the little boys
discussed it eagerly in the kitchen.  So, when the mother came home, she
found her little daughter quietly asleep, which was not often the case
when anything had happened to detain her father and mother from home
later than was expected.

But though Allison said nothing, she thought all the more about the
pleasure which the child so longed to enjoy with the rest.  Before she
slept, she startled her mistress not a little, entering of her own free
will into an account of the schoolmistress' plan to take the bairns to
the hills for the sake of their health, and ending by asking leave to
take little Marjorie to "the Stanin' Stanes" with the rest.  She spoke
as quietly as if she had been asking a question about the morning's
breakfast, and waited patiently for her answer.  Mrs Hume listened
doubtfully.

"I hope she has not been setting her heart upon it.  It will be a sad
disappointment to her."

"If it must be a disappointment.  No, we have had no words about it.
But she heard it from the mistress.  It wad be as good for her as for
the other bairns."

"I fear it would not be wise to try it.  And she can hardly have set her
heart upon going, or she would not be sleeping so quietly."

"It would do her good," persisted Allison.

"And you could trust her with Allison, and Robin might meet them and
carry the child home," said the minister.

Mrs Hume turned to him in surprise.  When the minister sat down in the
parlour to take a half-hour's recreation with a book, he became, as far
as could be observed, quite unconscious of all that might be going on
around him, which was a fortunate circumstance for all concerned,
considering the dimensions of the house, and the number of people in it.
But never a word, which touched his little daughter, escaped him,
however much his book might interest him.

"You would take good care of her, Allison?" repeated he.

"Ay, that I would."

"If it were a possible thing that she could go I would not be afraid to
trust her with Allison.  But the risk of harm would be greater than the
good she could get, or the pleasure."

"It is a long road, and I doubt ye might weary, Allison," said the
minister.

"I hae carried hame lost lammies, two, and whiles three o' them, a
langer road over the hills than the road to the Stanin' Stanes.  Ay,
whiles I grew weary, but what of that?" said Allison, with an animation
of face and voice that astonished them both.

"Well!  We'll sleep on it.  A wise plan at most times when doubtful
questions are being considered."

And who could measure the delight of the child when it was told her that
she was to go to the hills with the rest?  If her mother were still only
half convinced of the wisdom of the measure, she did not suffer her
anxiety to appear in a way to spoil her little daughter's pleasure.  And
Marjorie moderated her raptures and was wonderfully quiet and unexcited
while all preparations were going on.  Nor did she show impatience when
she had still some time to wait after her little brothers had set out to
join the other bairns at the school.

The mistress was to have the help of some of the elder girls in
marshalling the little lads and lassies, and in encouraging them through
the rather long, tramp up the hills.  Allison, who had been busy from
early morning, and had still something to do, assured the child that it
would only be a weariness for them both if she were obliged to measure
her steps by those of the bairns, and that they would reach the Stanin'
Stanes before them; though they gave them a whiles start.

"They are doing one another good," said the minister, as they stood at
the door, following with their eyes the stately figure of Allison as she
went steadily down the street, looking neither to the right hand nor the
left.  But it was "lanesome like" to go back into the parlour and look
at Marjorie's empty couch.

And Marjorie was moving on, as she sometimes did in her dreams, down the
street, and past the well on the green, and over the burn, and up the
brae, first between hedges that would soon be green, and then between
dikes of turf or grey stone, till at last Allison paused to rest, and
then they turned to look at the town, lying in a soft haze of smoke in
the valley below.

They could see the manse and the kirk and the trees about the garden,
and all the town.  They could see the winding course of the burn for a
long way, and Burney's Pot, as they called the pond into which the burn
spread itself before it fell over the dam at Burney's mill.  A wide
stretch of farming land rose gradually on the other side of the valley
beyond.  Some of the fields were growing green, and there were men
ploughing in other fields, and everywhere it looked peaceful and bright,
"a happy world," Marjorie said.  They could see Fir Hill, the house
where Mrs Esselmont lived in summertime--at least they could see the
dark belt of firs that sheltered it from the east and half hid it from
the town.

"It's bonny over yonder.  I was there once, and there is such a pretty
garden," said Marjorie.

Then they went on their way.  It was the loveliest of spring days.  The
sun did not shine quite all the time, because there were soft white
clouds slowly moving over the sky which hid his face now and then.  But
the clouds were beautiful and so was their slow movement over the blue,
and the child lay in Allison's arms, and looked up in perfect content.

Spring does not bring all its pleasant things at once in that northern
land.  The hedges had begun to show their buds a good while ago, but
they had only buds to show still, and the trees had no more.  The grass
was springing by the roadside, and here and there a pale little flower
was seen among it, and the tender green of the young grain began to
appear in sheltered and sunny spots.  Oh! how fair and sweet it all was
to Marjorie's unaccustomed eyes!

"Oh, Allie!" said she, "can it be true that I am here?"

She could not free her arms from the enveloping shawl to clasp Allie's
neck, but she raised herself a little and laid her cheek against hers,
and then she whispered:

"I prayed the Lord to let me come."  Then they went on in the soft warm
air their pleasant way.  By and by they left the road and went over the
rougher ground that lay between them and the end of their journey.  In a
hollow where there was standing water, Allison took the wrong turning,
and so going a little out of the way, came suddenly on the mistress and
her noisy crowd of bairns, who were looking for them in another
direction.

It was a day to be remembered.  But it was not all pleasure to every
one, though every moment was full of delight to Marjorie.  The bairns
were wild and not easily managed, and the mistress "had her ain adoes
among them."  Of course the tawse had been left at home, and the
sternness of countenance which was the right and proper thing in the
school, the mistress felt would be out of place among the hills, even
supposing the bairns would heed it, which was doubtful.  As for setting
limits beyond which they were not to wander, that was easily done, but
with all the treasures of the hills awaiting discovery, was it likely
that these limits would be kept in mind?

The mistress strode after the first wandering group, and called after
the second, and then she declared that "they maun gang their ain gait,
and tak' their chance o' being lost on the hills," and she said this
with such solemnity of countenance as to convince the little ones who
remained that they at least had best bide where they were.  It was not
likely, after all, that anything more serious than wet feet or perhaps
torn clothes would happen to them--serious enough troubles in their own
way, and likely to be followed by appropriate pains and penalties
without the intervention of the mistress.  At any rate they must just
take their chance.

So, she "put them off her mind," and with the other bairns, and Allison
carrying Marjorie in her arms, wandered for a while among "the Stanes."

Seven great stones there were, arranged around another greater still;
and they might well wonder, as many had wondered before them, how they
had been brought there, and by whom, and for what purpose.  That is,
Marjorie wondered, and told them what her father thought, and Robin; and
Allison listened and smiled, and wondered too, since she was called to
think about it at all.

As for the mistress, the "Stanin' Stanes" were just the Stanin' Stanes
to her.  She accepted them as she did the hills themselves, and the
heather, and the distant mountains; and she objected decidedly to the
minister's opinion as announced by his little daughter.

"We are maybe standing in a temple where, hundreds and hundreds of years
ago, the folk worshipped an unknown God," said Marjorie.

The mistress vehemently dissented.

"What should put the like o' that in the minister's head?  It's an ill
thing for ane to try to be wise aboon what's written."

"But it's all in a book," said the child eagerly.  "Robin read it to my
mother and me.  And in the Bible ye ken there were folk seeking Him, `if
haply they might feel after Him and find Him.'  And maybe they were
doing that here."

But the mistress would not hear such a thing said.

"Think ye the Lord wad hae letten stan' a' these years in a Christian
land like Scotland sic monuments o' will worship and idolatry?  Na, na,
lassie, I couldna believe that, though your father should preach it out
o' the poopit."

"But, Mistress Jamieson, the Lord lets ill men (evil men) live in
Scotland, and has patience with them, and whiles saves them from their
sins.  And maybe the folk were `feeling after Him' in those faraway
days."

"John Beaton told my father that these muckle stanes are quite different
from the rest o' the stanes upon the hills hereaboot," said Annie
Cairns.

"John Beaton nae less!" said the mistress scornfully.  "As gin the Lord
couldna put what kin' o' stanes He liket wherever it was His will to put
them.  And what kens John Beaton mair than the lave?"

"Grannie thinks it was the fairies that brocht them up the brae.  But
John kens weel about stanes."

It was Annie Cairns, one of the older lassies, who had made the last two
ventures.  It was certainly a bold thing for a lassie, who was every day
convicted in the school of lost loops in her stocking, to put in her
word with her betters on such a matter.  The mistress answered her with
a look which she knew well, and heeded little.  But it startled
Marjorie, who had only heard about such looks from her brothers.  Her
face warned Allison that enough had been said.

"Ye're growing tired, my lammie, and ye'll need to lie down and rest for
a while."

"Yes, I'm tired, now that I think about it," said the child, lying back
in her kind arms again.

The wind had grown a little sharp by this time, and they found a
sheltered spot on which the sunshine fell, on the south side of one of
the great stones; here Allie made a couch, and the child rested on it in
perfect content.  Some of the little ones were tired also, and fell
asleep, and were well happed by Allison and the mistress, and the rest
went away to amuse themselves for a while.

Marjorie did not mean to go to sleep.  She could see a wide stretch of
sky, over which the white clouds were wandering still, and the tops of
the faraway hills, and she thought she could see the sea.  But she was
asleep and dreaming when it came to that.

In the meantime, soothed by a whiff of her pipe, Mistress Jamieson was
getting on quite friendly terms with Allison, who had her good word from
that day forth.  For with the most respectful attention she sat
listening to the all-embracing and rather dismal monologue of the old
woman, as few were accustomed to do.  Did she listen?  She certainly did
not understand all that was said, and she could not afterward have
repeated a word of it.  But she saw a face, wrinkled and grey, and not
very happy--an old, tired face.  And if she was thinking of troubles
that had made deep lines in other faces, rather than of the cares and
vexations which had saddened the lot and soured the temper of the
schoolmistress, her silence and the softening look in her beautiful, sad
eyes, and the grave "ay" or "no" that came in response to some more
direct appeal, pleased and soothed the heart of the lonely old woman to
a sense of comfort which came seldom enough to her.

And though Allison's answers were of the briefest, when the mistress
began to question her about herself and her life before she came to
Nethermuir, they were civil, and they were quietly and readily given,
and fortunately there was not much time for questions; for the bairns
came straggling back by twos and threes as they had gone away.  Each
brought some treasure found in their wanderings, and Marjorie would have
been buried beneath the offerings of flowers, and tender green bracken,
and "bonny stanies" that were brought to her, if Annie Cairns had not
taken possession of them all, promising to carry them safe to the manse.

There were still some stragglers for whom they must wait.  There would
have been little good in going to search for them, and there was no need
to hurry home, for the afternoon was not far over--at least there would
have been no need if the bairns had not been all so ravenously hungry.
The "piece" which each had brought from home had been made away with by
the greater number, before even the "Stanes" were in sight, and the
additional supply which Allison had provided did not go very far among
so many.

In these circumstances, imagine the shout of welcome which greeted the
appearance of Robin with a bag upon his back--Robin's bag, the bairns
called it; but the treat of baps and buns was John Beaton's, who took
this way to celebrate his homecoming.  And it is to be doubted whether
he ever in all his life spent many other crown-pieces to better purpose,
as far as the giving or the getting or pleasure was concerned.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

  "Love sought is good, but love unsought is better."

John Beaton came slowly up the height which hid for the moment the spot
where the bairns had gathered, and Robin followed with his bag on his
shoulder.  Confusion reigned triumphant.  Some of the little ones had
become tired and fretful, and the elder girls were doing what they could
to comfort and encourage them.  But by far the greater number were as
lively as when they set out in the morning, and by no means in haste to
end their day of pleasure.  Up the shelving side of one of the great
grey stones they were clambering, and then, with shrill shrieks and
laughter, springing over the other side to the turf below.  Not the
slightest heed was given to the voice of the mistress, heard amid the
din, expostulating, warning, threatening "broken banes and bluidy noses,
ere a' was dane."  This was what Robin saw, and it was "a sight worth
seeing."

What John Beaton saw was Allison Bain standing apart, with Marjorie in
her arms, and he saw nothing else for a while.  Even Robin, with his bag
on his shoulder, stopped a moment to gaze at "our lass," as he called
her in a whisper to his friend.  She looked a very different lass from
"our Allie" in the manse kitchen, with her downcast eyes, and her
silence, and her utter engrossment with the work of the moment.  Her big
mutch had fallen off, and a mass of bright hair lay over the arm which
the child had clasped about her neck.  The air had brought a wonderful
soft colour to her cheeks, and her lips were smiling, and so were her
eyes, as she watched the wild play of the bairns, and her darling's
delight in it.  There was not a sign of stooping or weariness.

"Though Davie says she carried Maysie every step of the way," said
Robert to his friend.  "Man!  John!  It might be Diana herself!"

But John said nothing, and Robin had no time for more, for the bairns
had descried him and his bag, and were down on him, as he said, like a
pack of hungry wolves.

So John shook hands with the mistress, "in a dazed-like way," she said
afterward, and at the first moment had scarce a word for Marjorie, who
greeted him with delight.

"John, this is my Allie," said she, laying her hand on her friend's
glowing cheek, "and, Allie, this is Mrs Beaton's John, ye ken."

Allie glanced round at the new-comer, but she was too busy gathering
back the wisp of hair that the wind was blowing about her face to see
the hand which he held out to her, and the smile had gone quite out of
her eyes when she raised them to his face.

"They minded me o' Crummie's een," John told his mother long afterward.

The schoolmistress sat down upon a stone, thankful that her labours were
over, and that the guiding home of the bairns had fallen into stronger
hands than hers.  And as she watched the struggle for the booty which
came tumbling out of the bag, she was saying to herself:

"I hae heard it said o' John Beaton that he never, a' his days, looket
twice in the face o' a bonny lass as gin there were onything to be seen
in it mair than ordinar.  But I doot, after this day, _that_ can never
be said o' him again.  His time is come or I'm mista'en," added she with
grim satisfaction.  "Noo we'll see what's in him."

"And now, Maysie," said Robin, coming back when the "battle of the baps"
was over, "I'm to have the charge o' you all the way home, my mother
said.  Allie has had enough o' ye by this time.  And we have Peter
Gilchrist's cart, full o' clean straw, where ye can sit like a wee queen
among her courtiers.  So come awa', my bonny May."

But Allison had something to say to that proposal.

"No, no!  I'll not lippen her to you and your cairt; your mother could
never expect such a thing o' me," said she, clasping the child.

"Well, all I can say is, these were my orders, and ye maun take the
responsibility of disobedience.  What say ye, Maysie?"

"Oh!  Allie, it would be fine to go with the ither bairns in the cairt."

"But, my dearie, your mother never could have meant anything like that.
It would never, never do.  Tired!  No, I'm no' tired yet.  And if I were
ever so tired--"

"Will ye lippen her to me?  I have carried Marjorie many a time," said
John Beaton, coming forward and holding out his arms.

Allison raised her eyes to his for an instant, and then--not with a
smile, but with a sudden faint brightening of the whole face, better to
see than any smile, John thought--she put the child in his arms.

"Ay, I think I may lippen her to you, since ye have carried her before."

So the child was wrapped warmly, and was well content.

"And as ye have the cairt, and I'm not needed with the bairns, I'll awa'
hame, where my work is waiting me," said Allison to Robin, and she lost
no time.

They saw her appearing and disappearing, as she kept her way among the
heather for a while; and then John Beaton said, with a long breath, that
they would need to go.  So the mistress was made comfortable in the cart
with as many of the little ones as could be packed into it, and Robin
took the reins.  The rest of them went down the hill in a body, and all
got safely home at last.  And the happiest of them all was Marjorie when
John laid her tired, but smiling and content, upon her little couch.

"Oh, mother! it's fine to be like the other bairns.  I have had such a
happy day.  And, mother," she whispered, as her mother bent over her,
undoing her wraps, "you'll need to ask John to stay to tea."

But John would not stay.  He must take tea with his mother this first
night, he said, which Marjorie owned was but right.  So he went away.
He came back again to worship, however, after Marjorie was in bed.

Peter Gilchrist was there too, and Saunners Crombie.  It was a way the
folk o' the little kirk had, to time their business at the smithy or the
mill, so as to be able to drop in at the usual hour for family worship
at the manse.  At such times there was rather apt to be "lang worship,"
not always so welcome to the tired lads as to the visitors, and to-night
Jack and Davie murmured audibly to their mother when the chapter was
given out.

For the chapter was about Jacob seeking for his father's blessing, and
the lads felt that Peter and Saunners might keep on to any length about
him.  And so it proved.  Decided opinions were expressed and maintained
as eagerly as though each one present had a personal interest in the
matter.  Peter Gilchrist had his misgivings about Jacob.  He was "a
pawkie lad" in Peter's estimation--"nae just fair forth the gait in his
dealings with his brother, and even waur (worse) with his old blind
father, to whom he should have thought shame to tell lees in that
graceless way."

Saunners, on the other hand, was inclined to take Jacob's part, and to
make excuses for him as being the one who was to inherit the promise,
and the blame was by him laid at the door "of the deceiving auld wife,
Rebekah, by whom he had evidently been ill brocht up"; and so they
"summered and wintered" the matter, as Jack said they would be sure to
do, and for a while there seemed little prospect of coming to the end of
it.  But it mattered less to Jack or to Davie either, as they soon were
fast asleep.

The minister put in a word now and then, and kept them to the point when
they were inclined to wander, but the two had the weight of the
discussion to themselves.  As for John Beaton, he never opened his lips
till it was time to raise the psalm; and whether he had got the good of
the discussion, or whether he had heard a word of it, might well be
doubted, judging by the look of his face when Mrs Hume put the
psalm-book into his hand.

It was time to draw to an end, for there were several sleepers among
them before the chapter was done.  Allison had made a place for Davie's
sleepy head upon her lap, and then after a little her Bible slipped from
her hand, and she was asleep herself.  It had been a long day to her,
and her walk and the keen air of the hills had tired her, and she slept
on amid the murmur of voices--not the uneasy slumber of one who sleeps
against her will; there was no struggle against the power that held her,
no bowing or nodding, or sudden waking up to a sense of the situation,
so amusing to those who are looking on.  Sitting erect, with the back of
her mutch just touching the angle made by the wall and the half-open
door, she slumbered on peacefully, no one taking heed of her, or rather
no one giving token of the same.

After a time her mistress noticed her, and thought, "Allison has
over-wearied herself and ought to be in her bed," and she wished
heartily that the interest of the two friends in Jacob and his misdeeds
might speedily come to an end, at least for the present.  And then,
struck by the change which slumber had made on the beautiful face of the
girl, she forgot the talk that was going on, and thought only of
Allison.  The gloom which so often shadowed her face was no longer
there, nor the startled look, half fear and half defiance, to which the
gloom sometimes gave place when she perceived herself to be observed.
Her lips, slightly apart, had lost the set look which seemed to tell of
silence that must be kept, whatever befell.  The whole expression of the
face was changed and softened.  It looked very youthful, almost
childlike, in its repose.

"That is the way she must have looked before her trouble came upon her,
whatever it may have been," thought Mrs Hume with a sigh.  And then she
said softly to the minister: "I doubt it is growing late, and the bairns
are very weary."

"Yes, it is time to draw to a close."  So he ended the discussion with a
few judicious words, and then read the remaining verses of the chapter
and gave out the psalm.

Sometimes, on receiving such a hint from the mother, it was his way to
"omit the singing for a night."  But this was John Beaton's first night
among them, and the lads and their mother would, he thought, like the
singing.  And so he read the psalm and waited in silence for John to
begin, and then Mrs Hume turned toward him.

A little withdrawn from the rest, John sat with his head upon his hand,
and his eyes fixed on the face of Allison Bain.  His own face was pale,
with a strange look upon it, as though he had forgotten where he was,
and had lost himself in a dream.  Mrs Hume was startled.

"John," said she softly, putting the book into his hand.

And then, instead of the strong, full tones which were naturally to be
expected when John Beaton opened his lips, his voice rose, full, but
soft and clear, and instinctively the tones of Robin and his mother were
modulated to his.  As for the others, they did not sing at all.  For
John was not singing the psalm which the minister had read, nor was he
even looking at the book.  But softly, as a mother might sing to her
child, the words came:

  "Jehovah hear thee in the day
      When trouble He doth send,
  And let the name of Jacob's God
      Thee from all ill defend.

  "Oh! let Him help send from above
      Out of His sanctuary,
  From Sion His own holy hill,
      Let Him give strength to thee."

Allison's eyes were open by this time.  She seemed to be seeing
something which no one else saw, and a look of peace was on her face,
which Mrs Hume had never seen on it before.  "She must have been
dreaming."  Then the singing went on:

  "Let Him remember all thy gifts,
      Accept thy sacrifice,
  Grant thee thy heart's wish, and fulfil
      Thy thoughts and counsels wise."

And then John's voice rose full and clear, and so did the voices of the
others, each carrying a part, in a way which made even the minister
wonder:

  "In thy salvation we will joy,
      In our God's name we will
  Lift up our banner, and the Lord
      Thy prayers all fulfil."

Then the books were closed, and the minister prayed, and without a word
or a look to any one, except only sleepy Davie, Allison rose and went
away.  But in her heart she was repeating:

  "Grant thee thy heart's wish and fulfil
  Thy thoughts and counsels wise.
  In thy salvation we will joy--"

"Maybe the Lord has minded on me, and sent me this word.  I will take it
for a sign."

The two friends went out into the dark, as Saunners said, "strengthened
by the occasion," but it was not of Jacob, nor his blessing nor his
banishment that they "discoorsed" together as they jogged along, sitting
among the straw in Peter's cart.  Peter was inclined to be sleepy after
the long day, and had he been alone he would have committed himself to
the sense and judgment of his mare Tibbie, and slept all the way home.
But his friend "wasna ane o' the sleepy kind," as he said, and he had
something to say.

"What ailed John Beaton the nicht, think ye?  He's ready eneuch to put
in his word for ordinar, but he never opened his mouth through a' the
exerceese, and was awa' like a shot ere ever we were off our knees, with
not a word to onybody, though he's but just hame."

"Ay, that was just it.  He would be thinkin' o' his mither, puir bodie,
at hame her lane."

"Ay, that micht account for his haste, and it micht weel hae keepit him
at hame a'thegither, to my thinkin'.  But that needna hae keepit his
mouth shut since he was there.  It's no' his way to hide his licht
aneath a bushel as a general thing."

"It wad be a peety gin he did that.  Licht is needed among us," said
Peter, who admired in his friend the gift of easy speaking, which he did
not possess himself.

"Oh! ay, that's what I'm sayin'.  And what for had he naething to say
the nicht?  I doot it's nae just as it should be with him, or he wad hae
been readier with his word."

"There's sic a thing as being ower-ready wi' ane's word.  There's a time
to keep silence an' a time to speak, according to Solomon.  But word or
no word I'm no' feart for John Beaton."

"Weel, I canna just say that I'm feart for him mysel'; and as ye say,
he's maybe whiles ower-ready to put in his word wi' aulder folk.  But
gaein' here and there among a kind o' folk, he has need to be watchfu'
and to use his privileges when he has the opportunity."

"We a' need to be watchful."

"Ay, do we, as ye say.  But there are folk for whom ower-muckle
prosperity's nae benefit."

"There's few o' us been tried wi' ower-muckle prosperity of late, I'm
thinkin'.  And as for John, if a' tales be true, he has had his share o'
the ither thing in his day."

"Weel, I hae been hearin' that John Beaton has had a measure o'
prosperity since he was here afore, and if it's good for him it will
bide wi' him.  He kens Him that sent it, and who has His e'e on him."

"Ay, ay; it's as ye say.  But prosperity or no prosperity, I'm no' feart
for John."

"Weel, I canna just say that I'm feart for him mysel'.  Gin he is ane o'
His ain, the Lord will keep a grip o' him, dootless.  It's no' that I'm
feart, but he has never taken the richt stand among us, as ye ken.  And
ye ken also wha says, `Come oot from among them and be ye separate.'  He
ay comes to the kirk when he's here.  But we've nae richt hold on him.
And where he gaes, or what he does at ither places, wha kens?  I hae ay
fear o' folk that are `neither cauld nor het.'"

Fortunately the friends had reached the spot where their ways parted,
and Peter, being slow of speech, had not his answer ready, so Saunners
went home content at having said his say, and more content still at
having had the last word.

All this time John Beaton was striding about the lanes in the darkness,
as much at a loss as his friend, Saunners Crombie, as to what had
happened to him.  He had not got the length of thinking about it yet.
He was just "dazed-like," as the schoolmistress would have said--
confused, perplexed, bewildered, getting only a glimpse of what might be
the cause of it all, and the consequences.

If he had known--if it had come into his mind, that the sorrowful eyes
which were looking at him out of the darkness--the soft, brown eyes,
like Crummie's, which had met his first on the hilltop, might have power
over him to make or to undo, as other eyes had wrought good or evil in
the lives of other men, he would have laughed at the thought and scorned
it.

He had had a long day of it.  Since three in the morning he had walked
the thirty miles that lay between Nethermuir and Aberdeen, to say
nothing of the rumble in Peter Gilchrist's cart to the Stanin' Stanes,
and the walk home again with little Marjorie in his arms.  No wonder
that he was a little upset, he told himself.  He was tired, and it was
time he was in his bed.  So with a glance at the moon which was showing
her face from behind a cloud--she had a queer look, he thought--he
turned homeward.

He stepped lightly, and opened the door softly, lest his mother should
be disturbed so late.  A foolish thought of his, since he knew that "his
very step had music in't" to her ears.

"Well, John?" said she, as he paused a moment at her door.  And when he
did not answer at once, she asked, "Is it well with you, John?"

"Surely, mother.  Why should you ask?"

"And they were glad to see you at the manse?"

"Oh! yes, mother.  They're ay kind, as ye ken."

"Ay, they're ay kind.  And did you see--Allison Bain?"

"Allison Bain!" repeated John, dazed-like still.  "Ay, I saw her--at the
Stanin' Stanes, as I told you."

"Yes, you told me.  And all's well with you, John?"

"Surely, mother," repeated John, a little impatiently.  "What should ail
me?"  And then he added, "I'm tired with my long tramp, and I'll away to
my bed.  Good-night, mother."

He touched with his strong, young fingers the wrinkled hand that lay on
the coverlid, and the touch said more to her than a kiss or a caress
would have said to some mothers.

"Sleep sound!" said she.

But the charm did not work, for when daylight came he had not closed his
eyes.

CHAPTER NINE.

  "The honest man, howe'er so poor,
  Is king of men for a' that."

John Beaton's father had been John Beaton also, and so had _his_ father
before him.  The first John had farmed a three-cornered nook of land,
which had found a place among the grey stones scattered closely over a
certain part of the high coast that looks down upon one of the narrow
bays setting in from the North Sea.

He must have been a strong man, this John, for on this bit of land he
lived and laboured for sixty years and more, and on it he brought up,
and then sent out, to make a place for themselves, in their own, or in
other land's, five strong sons and four fair daughters.  And he had so
brought them up that never, as long as he lived, did he, or any one
else, hear aught of son or daughter to cause him to bow his good grey
head before the face of man.

One son, neither the eldest nor the youngest, stayed near home.  First
he had broken stones on one of the great highways which they were
stretching through Scotland about that time.  Then he learned to cut and
dress the grey granite of his native hills, and then to build it into
houses, under another man's eye, and at another man's bidding.  After a
time he took his turn, first as overseer, and then as master-builder,
and succeeded, and men began to speak of him as a rising man, and one
well-to-do in the world.  All this was before he had got beyond middle
life.

Then he married a woman "much above him," it was said, but that was a
mistake.  For though Marion Sinclair came of a good stock, and had all
her life lived in a home well placed and well plenished, among folk who
might have thought themselves, and whom others might have thought to be
John Beaton's superiors, yet no man or woman of them all had a right to
look down on John Beaton.  He stood firm on his own feet, in a place
which his own hand had won.  No step had he ever taken which he had
needed to go back upon, nor had he ever had cause to cast down his eyes
before the face of man because of any doubtful deed done, or false word
spoken.

And Marion Sinclair, no longer in her first youth, might well go a proud
and happy bride to the home of a man wise and strong, far-seeing,
honest, and successful--one who loved her dearly, as a man of middle age
may love, who in his youth has told himself that he had neither will nor
time for such sweet folly.

With all his strong and sterling qualities he was regarded by the world
in general, as, perhaps, a little hard and self-opinioned.  But he was
never hard to her, or to the one son who was born to them.  He exacted
what was his due from the rest of the world, but he was always soft and
yielding to them in all things.  He was proud of his success and of his
good name in the countryside, and he offended some of those who came
into contact with him by letting his pride in all this be too plainly
seen.  But he was prouder far of his wife, and his happy home, and of
his young son, with whom, to his thought, no prince in all the land
could compare.

And so it went well with him, till one day the end came suddenly.  A
broken bank, a dishonoured name, scathe and scorn to some--to him among
the rest--who was, God knows, neither in deed nor in thought guilty of
the sin which had brought ruin upon thousands.

He made a gallant stand for his good name and his well-earned fortune,
and for his fellow-sufferers; but he was an old man by this time, and he
died of it.

Mrs Beaton had never all her life been a strong woman, and had never
needed to think and act for herself in trying circumstances.  She had
not the skill to plan nor the strength to execute, and it was too late
to begin now.  But she could endure, and she did so, with long patience;
and though her face grew thin and white, she gave no sign of anger, or
discontent, or of breaking down under her troubles, as all her little
world had believed she would surely do.

Amid the din and dulness of the great town in which they first took
refuge for a while, she made a home for her son, and waited patiently to
see what his young strength might do for them both, and never, by word
or look, made his struggle for standing room in the crowd harder for
him, or his daily disappointment worse to bear.

He fought his way to standing room at last--standing room at a high desk
in a dark office, at work which he had still to learn, and which, though
he loathed it, he might have learned to do in time if it had not
"floored him" first.

"Mother," he cried one night in despair, "let us get away from this
place--anywhere, where there is room to breathe.  I will work with my
hands as my father did before me.  There are still surely stones to
break somewhere up there in the north.  We'll get fresh air at least."

So, without a word of doubt or of expostulation, she made haste to get
ready, while they had yet the means of going, and they went north
together, where they found, indeed, fresh air, and for a time they found
nothing else.  But fresh air was something to rejoice in, since it
brought back the colour to the lad's cheeks and lightened the heart of
the mother, and they kept up one another's courage as well as might be.

A chance to earn their bread, that was all John wanted, and it came at
last; but it was dry bread only for a while.

"What can you do?  And what are you willing to do?" said a man who was
the overseer of other men, and whom John had seen several times at the
place where his work was done.  John answered:

"I am willing to do anything.  And I think I could break stones."

"I think I see you!" said the man with a shrug.

"I only wish I had a chance to show you.  I think I might even chip awa'
at cutting them, to as good purpose as some of those lads yonder."

"Here, Sandy," said the overseer.  "Gie this lad your hammer, and let
him try his hand, for the fun o' the thing."

The man laughed, but John Beaton was in earnest.  In a minute his coat
was off, and he set to work with a will.  He needed a hint or two, and
he got them, with a little banter thrown in.  The lad stuck to his work,
and could, as his friend said, "do no' that ill."  He had perhaps
inherited the power to do the work, since he could do it, he thought,
and he asked leave to come again in the morning.

"Ye hae earned your shilling," said the overseer, when it was time to
go, and he held one out to John.  He hardly expected the lad to take it,
but he took it gladly, and looked at it, the man thought, in a curious
way.

"Is it the first shilling ye ever earned?" said he.

"The very first!  May I come back to-morrow?"

"O, ay! gin ye like; but I should think that this is hardly the kind o'
work ye're best fitted for."

"One must take what one can get," said John.

That was the beginning.  He went again, and as hands happened to be
scarce at the time, he was kept on, and his wages were raised as his
skill and his strength increased.  By and by he was offered permanent
work on a mill that was to be built in a country place at some distance.
It would take months to build, and he would be sure of work for that
time; so he took his mother with him, and what household stuff they had
left, and lived in a tiny room in a cottage for a while.

Not very far from the new mill was Nethermuir, a quiet place, out of the
way, where they might live, they said to one another, unknown and
forgotten.  And here, after many thoughts about it, they resolved to
make themselves a home.

At the end of the street on which stood the missionary kirk and manse,
was a small house which had once been of the better sort, but which had
been vacant for some time, and had fallen into disrepair.  The thatch
was rotten and the roof had partly fallen in, but the foundation was
firm, and the walls were thick and strong.  This house John leased for
seven years, at a very small rent, and by his own strength, and skill,
and will, with some help from his fellow-workmen, he made of it such a
house as was not unworthy of being a home for his mother; and in it,
while her son went here and there as his work called him, she lived
content.

Terrible as the blow was which took from them husband and father and
home, it might have been worse in the end had John Beaton died a rich
man.  So said some of the lookers-on, who long before that time had
declared that his son, having all his life long got more of his own will
than was good for him, was in a fair way to become a "spoiled laddie" at
last.

Some said it who envied the lad, and others said it who loved him well,
and it is possible that they were not far wrong in the belief.  John the
younger was a "bonny lad," tall and strong, sweet-tempered and
light-hearted, a favourite with all.  But he was open to temptation like
the rest of his kind, even more so than many, and not all of those who
gathered round him in his prosperous days were of the sort likely to
influence him for good.  He went through the first years at the
university without getting much good from it, it was said.  He had
disappointed his father greatly, as well as his teachers; but though he
had been foolish and idle, he had not disgraced himself by anything
beyond idleness and folly.  Whether he would have gone through the
course without doing worse, might be questioned.

The chance was not given him.  His father died, and instead of
inheriting what would have been called wealth among those who were his
friends, he found himself penniless, having his own bread, and possibly
his mother's also, to win.  And seeing there was good stuff in the lad,
his mother's helplessness and desolation might be the saving of him,
said one of his mother's humble friends.

They had friends--yes, many of them--but some of them had suffered loss
as they themselves had suffered, and had no power to help except with
kind words.  Others who had the power to help had not the will, or only
the will to help in their own way.  Others added to their offers advice
that could not be followed, or they hurt the sore hearts of the lad and
his mother with words which implied censure on the dead, because he had
not foreseen and provided against the coming of evil days.  And so,
seeing no help among "kenned folk," the two went out, "not knowing
whither they went."

They had gone away bravely enough, and even through the dark days which
came first, it cannot be said that they quite lost heart or hope.  As
long as his mother was content, John told himself, he did not care what
fell to him to do or to endure; and as long as John was well, and within
reach of hand or voice, it was well with the mother.  It was not till
the first months were over that John's heart seemed to fail.  When the
mill was finished, instead of going with the men to other work in
another direction, he remained in Nethermuir, hoping to find something
to do in the neighbourhood, so that he might be near his mother.  He
found enough to do for a time in making the little house a comfortable
and even beautiful home for her.  Then he prepared the neglected bit of
ground around it for a garden and took pleasure in doing it.  It was
work which he liked, and which he knew how to do, but it put nothing
into the family purse, which was getting low, and something must be done
to replenish it.

He worked for a few weeks in harvest in the narrow fields of Peter
Gilchrist, and to good purpose, though the work was new to him; and he
made friends with Peter himself, which was something.  But the harvest
wore over and winter was coming on, and then he wrote to Jamie Dunn, his
first friend, saying he was now ready and willing to go wherever he
should be sent.

But in his heart he knew that for the only work which was left to him to
do, he was neither ready nor willing, nor for the kind of life which he
saw stretching a long, weary way before him.

He could do as his father had done before him, he told his mother
cheerfully, and who had done better than he?  But to himself he owned
that this was to be doubted.  He could never do as his father had done;
he was not the man his father had been, or he could never have played
the fool, wasting his time and losing his opportunities, as he had done.
He had been spoiled with softness, with idle days, and the pleasant
things of life, which he could not forget, and which, like a weakling,
he was in his secret heart longing for still.  And even his father had
not won what men called success, and a firm footing among his fellows,
till the best part of his life was over.

But his father had been content through all his days as they came, and
with his day's work and his day's wages.  And his father had known his
own strength and could bide his time.  As for his son, John told himself
that he was neither strong nor wise.  He knew, or he feared at this
time, that only the thought of his mother and her need of him kept him
from despair.

He called it despair, poor lad, not knowing what he said.  The depths of
despair came to him with the thought of enlisting as a common soldier,
to go away and live his life with as little exercise of his own will as
the musket he carried, and to death and a nameless grave.  Or it meant
to sail away before the mast, a slave to some tyrant who held the power
of life and death, because he held the power of the lash.  And it might
have come to one or other of these possibilities with him, if it had not
been for his mother and her need of him.

For the dead level of the life which he saw stretching out before him
seemed even worse to him than that--the life of ceaseless,
ill-remunerated labour, the companionship of men grown dull through a
changeless routine of toilsome days, or debased through ignorance or
self-indulgence, a life and a companionship with which he might at last
grow content, being no stronger or wiser than other men.

These were dark days for the young man.  At last he took his mother's
gently spoken words of counsel to heart, and opened the box in which she
had secretly packed his college-books, and where they had lain hidden
all this time.  But the sight of them, and the associations they called
up, made him heartsick and ashamed, and it was only by the exercise of
strong self-restraint that he made himself pretend to take some interest
in them for his mother's sake.  After this he fell into the way of
taking long walks in all directions, and did a turn of work here and
there as he could get it, and generally came home hungry, and tired, and
ready for his bed, so that no reading could be expected of him.

But the days were growing short, and the dark hours many and long, and
the mother's heart "grew wae" for her son many a time.  By and by
something happened.

It was a good thing for the minister's Davie that John Beaton was within
sound of the voices of the lad's terrified companions the day that he
fell into "Burney's Pot," and it was a good thing also for John.  The
little lad was nearly gone when he was pulled out of the water, and
having no knowledge of his home or name, since his young companions had
taken to their heels as soon as they saw Davie safe, John took him home
to his mother, and together they did what could be done for his help.

This was the beginning.  Davie was allowed to fall asleep in Mrs
Beaton's bed, and in the gloaming John carried him home wrapped in a
blanket, and then he saw the minister and his wife and Marjorie.  It was
the beginning for John of more than can well be told.

His manner of life from that time was changed.  Not that he went often
to the manse at first, though the door was always open to him, and a
welcome awaiting him.  But the life he saw there, the words he heard,
and the spirit that showed in all that was done, or said, or planned, in
great things and in small, came like a new revelation to him; and the
more he saw and thought of it all, the less he thought about his own
loss and his changed life and his unhopeful prospects.

He had more days of leisure that winter than well pleased him, but not
one of them was spent in wandering aimlessly about the dreary hills.  He
had company, most days, wherever he went.  If he had not Robin or Jack,
there was always Davie, who seemed to think he had a special claim upon
him.  Davie had not yet been promoted to a seat in the parish school,
but was beginning to think himself, at eight, too big a boy for Mistress
Jamieson's rule, since he could say the Catechism from end to end,
proofs and petitions and all.  With Davie trotting along at his side,
John had little chance for brooding.  Besides, he had taken to his books
again, and meant to employ his leisure and make up for lost time if such
a thing might be.  It was not likely that he would have much use for
Latin or Logic in the life that lay before him, he told himself; but he
might as well make the most of the idle days, and keep his mind from
stagnation.

And he had less of leisure after a while.  It was about this time that
he began to try his hand at the making of "headstones" for the kirkyard.
Chance put such work in his way, and being ready of hand and quick of
eye, and having long patience and much need of a job, he set to work
with a will.  He did not succeed in pleasing himself, but he pleased his
employer, which answered the purpose; and he did more at the work, at
odd times, when he could get nothing else to do.

The life which he saw lived in the manse did something for him, and the
Word as it was held forth in the little kirk did more; but that came
long afterward.  The minister was the busiest of men, either among his
books or among his people, or in his garden or his land; but he was
never too busy for a cheery word to John, or for help or counsel to any
one who needed them.  And the same might be said of the minister's wife.
She was active and had enough to do at home, but she was glad to help
those who needed help anywhere.  She had good sense and good judgment,
and was ready with sweet words or sharp words, as the case presented
seemed to demand.  She was firm where firmness seemed to be required,
but had long patience and unfailing gentleness in her dealings with the
weak and even with the wilful; and as the days passed, John took heed of
her words and ways with ever-growing interest.

She had not an easy life, but she had usually firm health and she had a
cheerful nature, and the peace of God was in her heart.  So she "stood
in her lot" strong and unafraid, whatever might befall.

She was a loving mother to her sons, but her rule was firm as well as
gentle.  There was no need in that house to appeal to the father's
stronger will where obedience was not promptly given.  It was a serious
matter indeed that needed an appeal to their father.  To the lads their
mother's word was law.  Not that the law was not forgotten sometimes, or
even wilfully broken in times of strong temptation.  But confession of
sins, though not always prompt, was, in course of time, quite certain.
She had their confidence entirely.  It was an unhappy boy, indeed, who
carried about, for even a few days, a sinful or sorrowful secret hidden
from his mother.

In among these lads John came as another brother, and Mrs Hume was kind
and gracious in her intercourse with him.  She was faithful also, and
told him of faults and failings which his own mother never acknowledged,
and helped him to correct them, as, even had she seen them, his own
mother might have hesitated to do.  It was, indeed, a good day for John
when the door of the manse was opened to him.

And then there was Marjorie, poor little soul, who was nearly nine, and
who looked like six, a fair, weak little creature, who could only walk a
step or two at a time, and who was yet as eager to know, and to do, and
to be in the midst of things as the strongest of them all.  "Another
brother," she called their new friend, who had more sense and patience
than Robin or Jack, and who could carry her so easily and strongly
without being tired.  It was a happy day for Marjorie when John came in
to see her.  It was better than a new book, she thought, to hear him
talk.

"And a new book is so soon done with," said Marjorie, who did not see
very many new books, and who had usually learned them by heart before
she had had them many days.  But John had always something to tell her.
He told her about new places and new people, and he had seen the sea,
and had sailed on it.  He had been in London and had seen the king and
the queen, "like the travelled cat," as Robin said.  And there was no
end to the stories he could tell her that she had never heard before.
She was never tired of listening to him, and hailed his coming with
delight, and long before he had come to feel quite at ease with the
mother, John had learned to love dearly the eager, gentle little
creature, from whose eyes the joy at his coming chased the look of pain
and weariness.

As for the friendship which grew more slowly, but quite as surely,
between John and the elder boys of the manse, it cannot be said whether
he or they benefited most by it.  To Robin and Jack, John seemed a far
wiser and stronger man than he knew himself to be--a man of wider
experience, higher aims, and firmer purpose.  And their belief in him,
their silent yet evident admiration of all his words and ways, their
perfect trust in his discretion and sympathy, did as much for him as for
them, and helped him to strive for the attainment of all the good gifts
which they believed him to possess.

He helped them in many ways.  He helped them at their work and kept them
back from taking part in many a "ploy," which, though only foolish, and
not so very wrong, were still both foolish and wrong to them, because in
engaging in them they would waste their time, and--being the minister's
sons--set a bad example to the rest of the lads, and, worst of all, vex
their father and their mother.  And they could bear to be restrained by
him, because, in the carrying out of all harmless fun, they profited by
many a hint from John, and sometimes even by his help.  But they all
agreed that the less said about this matter among the neighbours the
better for all concerned.

John had been in Nethermuir several months before he saw the inside of
the little kirk.  He knew little about the folk who worshipped there,
except that they were said to be "a queer kin' o' folk, who set
themselves up as better than their neebors, and wiser than a' their
teachers."  Differing, as they seemed to do, both in preaching and in
practice, from the kirk of the nation, they were doubtless wrong,
thought John.  But whatever they were, they were folk in whom he took no
interest, and with whom he had nothing at all to do.  So when he had
gone to the kirk at all, he had gone to the parish kirk to please his
mother, who was not always able to go so far herself.  Sometimes he had
permitted himself to go even farther than the kirk, coming back when the
service was half over to sit for a while on a fallen headstone, as
Allison did afterward when her turn came.

On fine days his mother went with him, and then it was different.  He
sat with the rest and listened to what the minister had to say, with no
inclination to find fault.  Indeed there was no fault to be found from
John's point of view or from the minister's.  It cannot be averred that
in what was said there was either "food or physic for the soul of man."
But not knowing himself to be in especial need of either the one or the
other, John missed nothing to which he had been accustomed all his days
to listen in the kirk.

"We had a good discourse," his mother would say, as they went slowly
home together, and John always assented.  "Yes, mother, we had a good
discourse."

So John went most days to please his mother.  But there came a day of
rain, and sleet, and bitter east wind, when, if her conscience would
have permitted, Mrs Beaton would have refrained from making her usual
suggestion about the propriety of honouring the Sabbath-day by going to
the kirk.  As for John, he was no more afraid of the rain, and the
sleet, and the east wind than he was afraid of the summer sunshine; but
when he proposed to go to hear Mr Hume, the sound of the sleet and the
rain on the windows silenced any objection she might have had to his
going "once in a way, the day being wild and wintry," and she even added
a hope that he might "hear something to do him good."

This was at the very beginning of his acquaintance with the minister and
his family.  If he had waited for a while, till the charm of their
friendliness and genuine kindness had wrought, till the time came when
he had seen with his own eyes, and heard with his own ears that which
proved his new friend to be different in some ways from the most of
those to whom he had all his life looked up as leaders and teachers, yet
not unworthy also to teach and to lead, John might have been better
prepared to get the good which his mother hoped for him.  And yet he
might not.  At any rate, it was to that dark day in the little kirk
that, in the years which came afterward, he looked back as the beginning
of "good" to him.

"A dismal hole," he called it, as he went in among the first and sat
down in a corner.  It was scarcely barer or more dingy and dim than the
rest of the kirks in country places were in those days; but it was very
small, and it had windows only on one side.  On that dark day it was
dismal, and it could not have been beautiful at any time.  The chill of
the sleet and the wild east wind had got into it, and John wondered at
the folk who should choose, of their own free will, to pass two hours,
or even three, in the damp and gloom and dreariness.  "There will be few
here to-day," thought he.

But they came one after another, and by twos and threes, and there was
the stamping of wet shoes, and the shaking out of wet plaids, and many a
sneeze, and many a "hoast" (cough).  And still more came, some of them
with familiar faces from the neighbouring streets, and some from beyond
the hills, miles away.  Peter Gilchrist was there, of course, and
Saunners Crombie, and an old woman or two, who would better have kept
the house, John thought, on such a day.  And by and by the kirk was well
filled.  John would have liked to see the minister's seat.  It was close
to the door, and so was the one in which he sat; but a little porch,
which protected the door, came between.  He heard the clatter of the
boys' feet as they came in, and once he heard their mother's "quietly,
boys," gently but firmly uttered, and by that time the minister was in
the pulpit, and the service began.

It was just to be like other services in other kirks, John thought at
first.  There was a psalm read, and a remark was made on a verse here
and there, and then they sang.  He had a certain enjoyment in the
singing, because he had never heard anything like it before.  The sleet
or something else had kept the usual precentor at home, and Saunners
Crombie filled the office for the time.  He had the singing mostly to
himself for the first verse, because no one knew what tune he meant to
sing, and some of those who joined, trying to do their best, "went out
of it a'thegither," as Saunners said angrily afterward.  The second
verse went better.  The minister's boys took it up and their mother, and
were joined by "the discordant crowd," as John called them while he
listened; and though he might have done good service on the occasion, he
never opened his lips.

Then came the "long prayer," in which John certainly did not join.  But
he listened, and after a little he wondered.  It was "like all the
prayers," he said to himself at first--confession, petition,
thanksgiving.  Yet it was a little different.  The words came with a
certain power.  It was as if he who prayed saw the face of Him whom he
addressed, a living Person whom he knew and had proved, and not an awful
unknown Being hidden in light unapproachable, or in dimness or darkness.
He was speaking to One whose promise had been given, and many times
made good unto those who trusted Him.  And to him who was asking,
evidently the promise was sure, the Word unchangeable.

"All good things!  Why, a man who believed that need be afraid of
nothing," said John to himself.

Then a chapter from the New Testament was read.  It was the one in
Corinthians about charity, from every verse of which a sermon might be
preached, the minister said; but he only lingered a minute on the verse
which speaks of the charity "which thinketh no evil," and by the little
stir that went through the congregation, John thought that perhaps a
word on that subject might be specially needed.

Then came the sermon, and John listened intently.  But he did not like
it.  He told his mother, when he went home, that he had heard the folk
saying about the kirk door that they had had a grand sermon.  "And they
should ken," said John with a shrug.

"The text?  Oh! it was a fine text: `Christ the power of God, and the
wisdom of God unto salvation.'  It was like no sermon I ever heard
before," said John, "and I am not sure that I ever wish to hear another
of the same kind."

John did not go to the manse that week, and he had no intention of going
to the kirk on Sunday, but when Sunday came he changed his mind and was
there with the rest.  He sat in his corner and listened, and wondered,
and grew angry by turns.

"Is not my Word like as a fire? saith the Lord, and like a hammer that
breaketh the rock in pieces?"

That was the text and that was the way in which the Word came to John
Beaton, and he would have none of it--for a time.

To his mother, who went to the kirk with him after a while, it came in
another way.  It was not new to her.  It was just what she had been
hearing all her life, she said, only the minister made it clearer and
plainer than ever it had been made to her before.  Or it might be that
her heart was more open to receive the Word than it used to be in former
days, when both heart and hands were full of the good things of this
life, which, she said, had contented her to the forgetting of the
Giver's greater gifts.

She had never been a woman of many words, and even to her son she rarely
spoke of these things.  But as time went on she grew sweeter and gentler
day by day, he thought.  He left her with less anxiety when he went
away, and he found her always when he came home peaceful and content.
For the peace of God was with her.

CHAPTER TEN.

  "O! love will venture in where it daurna weel be seen;
  O! love will venture in where wisdom ance has been."

Saunners Crombie had not been mistaken when he told his friend that "a
measure of prosperity" had, of late, come to John Beaton.  A debt long
due to his father had been paid to him, and the story which the debtor
had to tell was worth many times the money to John and his mother.

It was not the first good deed done in secret by the father which had
since his death come to the knowledge of the son.  Other stories had
been told by friends and neighbours, and even by comparative strangers,
of kind words spoken by him, and generous help given, which had healed
sick hearts, and opened the way out of depths of despair to some who
were sinners, and to some who were only sufferers.  And now this man
came to tell how he also had been helped--saved, he called it, and he
told it with tears in his eyes, though more than a generation had passed
since then.

David Cunningham was the son of the minister of the parish where the
first of the three Johns had lived, and where the second John and his
brothers and sisters had been born.  He had fallen into foolish ways
first, and then into evil ways, and through some act of inexcusable
folly, or worse, had, it seemed, shut upon himself the last door of hope
for a life of well-doing.  An offer of a clerkship in an East Indian
house had been given him by a friend of his family, and a sum sufficient
for his outfit had been advanced.  This sum he had lost, or rather it
had been claimed for the payment of a debt which he could not have
confessed to his father without breaking the old man's heart.  It would
have been utter ruin to the lad if John Beaton had not come to the
rescue.

This was before John was a rich man, or even had a prospect of riches,
but he gave the money willingly, even gladly, to save the son of his
father's friend.

"When you come home a rich man you can pay me, if I be living; and if I
be dead, you can pay it to them who may come after me," said he.  And
now David Cunningham had come home to pay his debt.

"Every month from the very first," he told John, "I put something away
toward it, and a good many months passed before the full sum was saved.
Then, when I wrote to your father that it was ready for him, he told me
to invest it for him, and let it grow till I should come home again.
That was five-and-thirty years ago, and it has grown well since then.
It is yours now, and much pleasure and profit may you get out of it."

"There is no fear of that," said John.

"And I have a better wish than that for you," said Mr Cunningham
gravely.  "May you have the chance and the heart to help to save some
poor fellow as your father saved me."

"Thank you for the good wish.  I will try to follow in my father's
steps," said John.  "But the money is my mother's, and the pleasure of
doing good with it will be hers."

"And if all I have heard of her be true, her pleasure will be to give
pleasure to her son," said his friend.

"Yes; that is true, too," said John.

But as the money was well invested, it was to be allowed to remain where
it was for the present.  The income from it would secure to his mother a
home more like that to which she was born than the one in which she had
lived since her husband's death, "though, God bless her, she has never
murmured," said her son.

And John was triumphing in his heart.  He saw, or he thought he saw, his
way clear to the carrying out of several plans, which he had been
dreaming about, but which he had hardly suffered himself to regard as
possible till now.  He had been in Aberdeen all the winter, working both
with his head and his hands.  He had fallen in with an old schoolfellow,
who was in the second year of his university course, a cripple lad, who
was altogether unfit for the kind of life enjoyed most by lads of his
age when set free from their lectures and their hours of study.  He was
living a lonely life till John found him, and his visits to the lad's
rooms were good for them both.

John had been reading steadily during the winter leisure of the years he
had been in Nethermuir, and now he enjoyed greatly going over the ground
with his friend, and gradually the knowledge came to him that he had
grown in mind as well as in stature since the days when he had trifled
with, or utterly neglected, the opportunities which had been given him.
He could do now with ease and pleasure that which in those idle days had
been a task and a burden.  Gradually that which had been a vague
longing, a half-acknowledged desire, became a settled purpose.

It was to consult with his mother as to the carrying out of this purpose
that he had come to Nethermuir at this time, and he had not meant to
sleep until all his plans were laid before her.  But when three days had
passed--on the fourth he was to return to Aberdeen--not a word with
regard to them had been uttered.  John had not got out of the maze into
which he had fallen when he first caught sight of Allison Bain, standing
with loosened hair and smiling eyes, watching the mad play of the
bairns, with little Marjorie in her arms.

He had not forgotten his plans or his purposes.  There were moments when
he would have been willing to forget them, when he even tried to forget
them and to smile at his thought of them, as he had sometimes smiled at
a foolish dream in the light of the morning.  He was not quite sure that
he needed to speak to his mother at all.  He might at least wait a
while.  Why should he trouble her by speaking about changes which might
never come?

And yet, had he not told his mother all his plans and even his thoughts
all his life?  Her word would make clear what course he should take.
Her "single eye" would see the fine scheme he had been dreaming about in
its true light.  He could trust his mother's wise simplicity more than
his own ambitious desires, which could hardly be worthy, he thought,
since they were the outcome of discontent.

And why should he not be content as he was?  He had fallen from no high
estate.  His father and his father's father had wrought with their
hands, and had been honoured of all who knew them.  Why should he not be
content to live as they lived, or to work his way upward to an easier
life, as his father had done?

"At any rate, I will have it out with my mother to-night," said he.

He was standing, when he came to this resolve, on the very spot where he
first caught sight of Allison Bain.  It was the second time he had stood
there since that day, for no reason that he could have told to any one.
He had come to the spot in the early morning after that first sleepless
night.  He needed a walk to stretch his legs, which were rather stiff
after the long tramp of yesterday, he told his mother, when he came home
to the breakfast he had kept waiting, and he told himself that he only
chanced to take that road rather than another.

He said nothing about it to Robert Hume.  They had the night before
agreed to take an early walk together.  Robin was late; but happily, as
he thought, he caught sight of John as he was disappearing over the
first hilltop, and followed with no thought of finding himself in the
way.

But when he came to the head of the last hillock, and saw John standing
where he had stood the day before, "looking at nothing," as Robin told
his mother afterward, he was seized with sudden shamefaced-ness, and
turning, shot like an arrow down the brae.

John had been less at the manse than he usually was while visiting his
mother.  He was to go there in the evening, and he must speak to his
mother before he said anything about his half-formed plans to the
minister or Mrs Hume, as he came home fully intending to do.  So he
turned homeward on the last afternoon; and as he walked he was saying to
himself, with indignant contempt of his indecision, that after all he
must be a poor creature, a fool, though he had never been in the way of
thinking so till now.

"Well, John lad," said his mother, looking up as he came in.

Her little maid had gone home for the day, and Mrs Beaton was sitting
in her arm-chair "just waiting," as she said.

It was a nice little room.  A bright fire burned in the grate, and a
shining tea-kettle was steaming on the hob.  The carpet on the floor was
faded and worn, and the furniture was of the plainest; but there were a
few pretty things in the room to brighten it, and over the mantel-piece
was a portrait of John's father, "taken at his best."  For some strange
reason, which he himself did not understand, John paused at the door,
and looked up at the strong, good face.

The picture was not much as a work of art perhaps, but it was a striking
likeness.  There was the firm mouth, and the kind grey eyes, and the
broad shoulders, rounded and stooping a little, after long years of
labour, and the abundant dark hair, which had showed no silver threads
until the last blow came to end all.  A sudden pang smote John's heart
as he looked.

"I was but a lad," he said to himself.  "I didna ken what he was till I
lost him."

"You are growing like him, John," said his mother softly.

"Am I, mother?  I doubt it is only your loving een that can see it."

"Are ye troubled, John?" were the words that rose to the mother's lips,
but they were not spoken.  "Ye're needing your tea, John," said she
instead.

John laughed.  "I'm needing something, and I'll be glad of my tea in the
meantime.  No, you are not to rise.  You are to sit still in your chair
and tell me what to do."

Not that he needed telling.  The skill, and the will, and the gentleness
natural to a loving daughter had come to this mother's son through long
and loving service.  So the little table was brought forward, on which
all things were already arranged.  The tea was "masket," and the teapot
covered with the "cosie," and during the three minutes necessary and
sufficient for its proper infusion, John went to his room, and the
mother's face grew grave while she waited.

"He's no' at peace with himself.  But he'll tell me if he's needing my
help.  God bless him and keep him this day--and forever and ay."

Then John came in and they had their tea, and spoke about other things,
about the visit she had had in the afternoon from little Marjorie, whom
Allison Bain had carried in her arms to see her, as she often did, and
of how the child was growing stronger every day.  And then they agreed
together that little Annie Thorn, who had been coming in to help Mrs
Beaton all these years, should come now to stay always, because it would
be better in many ways for both mistress and maid.  They spoke of other
things besides; but it must be acknowledged that John said little, and
was not so ready with assent or with response as he was wont to be when
his mother had anything to say to him.

After a time they fell into silence for a little, and then John said:

"I have something to tell you, mother."

"Is it good news, John?" said his mother with a little flutter at her
heart.

"Part of it is good, surely.  As for the rest--that may be good or bad,
as you shall take it."

"I'm waiting, John."

For John's head had drooped on his hand, and he sat thinking.

"And you're a wee anxious?  But there is no occasion, mother dear.  I
have good news.  I meant to tell you the night I came home.  I could
hardly wait till I got home to tell you.  I dinna ken how I put it off,"
added John hurriedly.  "Mother, did you ever hear my father speak of a
good turn he once did to one David Cunningham, a long time ago it must
have been?"

"No.  He wasna one who was in the way of telling o' the good turns he
did, as ye ken.  But I mind the name of Cunningham."

"This must have been before your day.  Maybe a good while before it."
And John went on to tell the story of his father's timely help to a
foolish lad, and of the debt which the man wished to pay, according to
his friend's desire, to those who came after him.  And when he had told
all he knew about it, and how the money which his father had given had
been increasing during all these years till it had become a sum so large
that the interest alone would keep his mother in comfort for the rest of
her life, his mother only said softly:

"Well, John?" as though the something which he had had to say was still
to be told.

"Well, mother, I think it is your turn now.  Wasna that grand of my
father?"

"It was like him.  And is this David Cunningham able to spare all that
money?  It would be an ill thing to harm or harass him now after so long
a time."

"I cannot say whether he be rich or poor; but I am certain sure that
nothing will hinder him from paying his debt.  He told me that the sight
of my face had given him more pleasure than anything he had seen in
Scotland yet," said John laughing.  "I would have brought him out to see
you, if the doctor would have let him come.  He is but a frail man, and
must go south again till summer is fairly here.  He said little about
himself, but I know he is a married man."

"And he would be sorry to hear of your father's losses at the last."

"Ay, that was he, and angry at the ill done him.  If he had but known,
he said, he could have helped to tide him over the worst of his
troubles, and it might have prolonged his life."

"It was God's will, and we must submit," said Mrs Beaton softly.

"Yes, it was God's will."  Then John rose and set the table back into
its place, and stirred the fire and sat down again.

"Well, John?" said his mother in a little.

"Well, mother!  You are a rich woman again, in a small way."

"I have ay been a rich woman.  If I had been asked would I have more, I
would have said I am content.  I am glad of this for your sake, John, if
you are glad.  But I think the message from your father, as it seems, is
more to me than the money."

"Yes, mother, and to me as well."

"You had something to tell me, John," said his mother, in a little.

"I thought I had when I came home.  Now I am not sure.  There is
something that we may speak about together, and you will help me to make
up my mind one way or the other."

Mrs Beaton listened in silence as John went on to tell her what he had
been doing and thinking for a while.  He had not been idle since the
building season ended.  He had been in the employment of one of the
builders of the town.  He had been able to make himself useful to him--
first by going over and putting to rights the books of the business,
which had fallen into confusion, and afterward at more congenial work,
where his knowledge of drawing, to which he had given much time when he
was a boy, was brought into account with a success which had surprised
himself.  And now his employer had offered him a permanent place, with
an opportunity to acquire the kind of knowledge of his work which would
come but slowly to him while he worked only with his hands.

He owned that he liked Mr Swinton, and that they got on well together.
Yes, the prospect of success seemed reasonably certain if he were to
give himself wholly to the work.  And then he came to a pause.

"Yes.  It looks like that," said his mother.  She missed the eager
hopefulness with which her son was wont to bring forward any new plan or
prospect of his, and she thought it wiser to let him go on of his own
accord to say his say than to question him.  "Do you think well of it,
mother?  But there is one thing to be said which will please neither you
nor me.  I doubt in such a case we will need to say farewell to
Nethermuir, and take up house in the town."

"Ay, we should both be sorry for that, but it could be done.  You have
more to say yet, John?"

"I thought I might have more to say, but since you are content with
things as they are, it might be as well to say nothing."

"Tell me what is in your mind, John.  You needna doubt but I'll take it
reasonably, whatever it may be."

John laughed.

"I have no fears for you, mother.  It is for myself and my own
discontents that I fear."

"Tell your mother, laddie."

Then he went on with his story.  How he had taken to college work in
earnest with Sandy Begg, how he had enjoyed it and been successful with
it, and how the thought had come into his mind that after all he might
go on again and redeem his character by doing now what he had failed to
do when the way was made easy to him.

"I think my father would be pleased, mother, if he could ken.  When I
think of him I canna forget that I gave him a sore heart at the time
when his troubles were coming thick upon him.  I would like to do as he
wished me to do, now that the way seems open."

"_Is_ the way open?" asked his mother gravely.  "If you take that way,
all that you have been doing and learning for the last years will be an
utter loss.  I have ay liked to think of you as following in your
father's steps to overtake success as he did."

"I am not the man my father was, as no one should ken better than my
mother."

"But if you were to fall in with this man's offer, you could take the
road your father took with fewer steps and less labour, and I might see
you a prosperous man yet before I die.  And all the good your father
did, whether openly or in secret, would begin again in his son's life,
and some of it, at least, your mother might see.  I canna but long for
the like of that, John."

"I would try to do my best, mother.  But my best would fall far short of
what my father did."

"Oh, fie!  John, laddie!  What ails ye at yourself the nicht, man?  Do I
no' ken my ain son by this time, think ye?  Ay, do I.  Better, maybe,
than he kens himsel'."

"There can be small doubt of that, mother.  Only your kind eyes see
fewer faults and failings than he kens of himself.  And, mother, I am
afraid the man who had my father for his good friend has done me an ill
turn.  He has, in a measure, taken away the motive for my work, and so I
can have little pleasure in it."

"But, John, you will have your ain life to live and your ain work to do
when your mother is dead and gone.  I have been pleased and proud to
have my son for breadwinner, and to ken that he was pleased and proud
for the same reason.  But for all that, I am glad that you are set free
to think of your ain life.  You are wearing on, lad, and it would be a
great gladness for me to see you in your ain house with wife and bairns
about you before I die.  Ye can let yourself think of it now, since I am
off your hands."

"May ye live to see all you wish, mother.  It winna be this while,
though.  There's time enough for the like of that."

"Well, that's true.  There's no' to say much time lost at
four-and-twenty.  But I am growing an old Woman and frail, and I mayna
have so very many years before me.  And ye needna put marriage off till
middle life as your father did.  Though he ay said had we met sooner it
might have been different even with him.  And it would be a wonderful
thing for me to see my son's wife and bairns before I die," repeated she
softly.

John rose and moved about the room.  He had to do it with caution, for
there was no space for more than two or three of his long, impatient
strides between the four walls.  His impulse was to rush out to the
darkening lanes or even to the more distant hills, that he might have it
out with himself there.

For his mother's words had moved him and a pair of wistful, brown eyes
were looking at him from the dying embers and from the darkness without.
He was saying to himself that the way lay straight before him if he
chose to take it--the way to moderate success in life, a competence
before his youth was past, and, as his mother had said, a wife and a
happy home.

And would all this content him?  Who could say?  No thought of these
things had troubled him, or even come into his mind till now.  And no
such thoughts would have come now, he told himself, if it had not been
for his mother's words and a pair of bonny een.  Should he let himself
be influenced by a dream--a mere fancy?

It would pass away, this folly.  It must pass away.  Would it be wise to
let circumstances guide him to take the course which seemed for the time
to be the easiest, the most direct to insure a measure of success?
Should he be wise in putting out of his thoughts the hopes and plans
which had been occupying him lately?  No, he was fit for higher work
than cutting stones or building or planning houses.  He could not go
back to such work now.  Even his mother's desire must be put aside when
the work of his life was in question.

And yet!--and yet his mother's simple wisdom had never failed him since
the day they had gone forth together from what had been the happiest of
homes.  She might be right, and he might be putting away the substance
to please himself by chasing a shadow.  So he said to himself, as she
waited quietly with folded hands.  He was anxious, uncertain,
bewildered, as unlike himself, or as unlike his own idea of himself, as
could well be.  He was amazed and angry at his foolishness, and eager
only to get away from his mother's eyes.

"I promised to go to the manse a while to-night, mother," said he with
his hand upon the door.

"Yes, and quite right.  The minister has clear vision and good sense,
and will give you none but good advice.  But bide a wee.  You have told
your mother nothing yet.  Sit down and let me hear what you are thinking
to do.  Since we have begun, it will be wise to go through to the end.
So that you truly ken your ain mind, I shall be content."

John was far from knowing his own mind.  That was what ailed him.  And
he had been so sure of himself before he came home.  And so sure also
that he could persuade his mother to see as he did about that which he
desired to bring to pass!  He did not feel that he could do justice to
himself of his plans and prospects at this moment.

He sat down, however, and went over the matter from the beginning.  He
said something also about his hopes and plans for the future.  He by no
means meant to give up his work at present.  He meant to work in the
summer as he had hitherto done, and go on with his reading in the
winter.  If he and Mr Swinton were to come to an agreement, it would be
all the easier for him.  He had no fear but that he could get on with
both work and reading till he had got through with the college at least.

"But, O John! it will be a lang look to the end!  I can hardly hope to
see it, though that would matter little if it were the best thing for
you.  But what is to come after?" asked his mother with a sigh.

John could not tell her that.  But there was nothing more certain than
that when he should be "thoroughly furnished," the right work would be
found--the very highest work--and a kind of life which would suit him,
though he might not grow rich in it.

"John," said his mother gravely, "I hardly think all that would help you
to live a better life than your father lived.  It is not the _kind_ of
work that matters; it is the way it is done.  Your father did his duty
in the sight of God and man, and went far beyond what folk whiles call
duty, never letting his left hand ken what his right hand was doing.
And I have ay hoped that ye might follow in his steps.  It is like a
slight on your father, John, when ye speak of higher work."

"Mother! you cannot really think that of me!  And, mother, you must mind
that my father meant me to do as I wish to do.  It is only to begin a
little later than he hoped.  And there is no fear but I shall see my
work when I am ready for it."

"And yet there is many a man in Scotland with a store o' book learning
who has done little work, or only ill work, for God and man.  And even
with a good-will the opportunity doesna ay come."

"Well, never mind, mother.  There is no pressing need to decide now, at
least till summer is over.  We will wait to see what may happen."  He
did not speak cheerfully, however.

"John," said his mother earnestly, "are ye sure that your heart is set
on this?  What has come to you?  Has anything happened to unsettle you,
lad?  Tell your mother, John."

John laughed as he rose and then stooped down and kissed her.

"Nothing has happened.  It is quite possible that you are right and that
I am wrong.  We will just wait and see, and decide the matter later.
Even if we have to leave Nethermuir, it need not be till summer is over.
I am sorry that I have troubled you with this now.  You will vex
yourself thinking about it all."

"'Deed I'll do nothing of the kind.  I'll just leave it all in better
hands than either yours or mine.  And as to your troubling me--Who has a
lad a right to trouble if it be not his ain mother?  And when a' is
said, our way is laid out before us by Him who kens a' and cares for a'.
Why should I trouble myself taking thought to-day for the things o'
to-morrow?  Go your ways to the manse, John, and I'll bide still and
think about it all."

But the visit to the manse was not so satisfactory as usual.  There were
other people there, and though John had a few minutes alone with Mr
Hume in the study, there was no time to enter fully into the matter
which he had at heart, and on which, he sincerely believed, he wished
for the minister's opinion and counsel, and so he said nothing about it.

Robin went down-stairs with him, and while he was making ready the
lantern to light the way to an outhouse, where Davie had a puppy which
his friend must see, John stood waiting by the kitchen-door.  In her
accustomed corner sat Allison, spinning in the light of the lamp which
hung high above her head.  She raised her eyes and smiled when John came
in, but she gave no other answer to his greeting, and went on with her
spinning, apparently quite unconscious of his presence.  As for him, he
found nothing to say to her, though the lighting of the lantern seemed
to take a good while.  To himself he was saying:

"I am glad I came.  Of course I knew it was but a fancy and utterly
foolish, and that: it would pass away.  But it is well to know it.  Yes,
I'm glad I came in."

Could this be the stately maiden he had seen smiling in the sunshine on
the hill, with wee Marjorie in her arms?  There she sat in the shadow,
with the accustomed gloom on her face, wearing the disguise of the big
mutch with the set-up borders, tied with tape under the chin.  An apron,
checked in blue and white, held with its strings the striped, short gown
close over the scanty petticoat of blue.  John wondered whether her
thoughts ever wandered away from the thread she was drawing from the
head of flax so silently.

"A decent, dull servant-lass, strong and wholesome, invaluable doubtless
in her place, but just like any other lass of her kind."  That is what
he said, and then he added:

"She has bonny een."  Ay, wonderful soft een, with a world of sorrow and
sweetness in them; and he waited with impatience till she should lift
them to meet his again.  But she did not.  And though he let the lads
pass out before him, and turned at the door to look back, there she sat,
busy with her thread and her own thoughts, with never a thought of him.

"A good lass," he repeated as he followed the lads; but he could not
quite ignore the sense of discomfiture that was on him, as he went down
the lane with Robin at his side.  He had enough to say to Robin.  He had
something to tell him about his winter's work, and without meaning to do
so, he gave him "an inkling," as Robin called it to his mother, of the
plans he had been making, and of the new course which was opening before
him.

But John said no more to his mother.  It was late when, he came home
that night, and there was no time for many words in the morning, for he
had a long journey before him.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

  "Oh! the happy life of children still restoring joy to ours!
          Back recalling all the sweetness."

Summer came slowly but happily to Marjorie this year, bringing with it,
oh! so many pleasures to which she had hitherto been a stranger.  She
had had the early spring flowers brought into the parlour many a time,
and ferns and buds and bonny leaves, for all the bairns of the place
were more than glad to be allowed to share their treasures with her; and
the one who came first and brought the most of these, thought herself
the happiest, and great delight in past summers had all this given to
the child.  She had watched, too, the springing of the green things in
the garden, the wakening of pale little snowdrops and auriculas, and the
gradual unfolding of the leaves and blossoms on the berry-bushes, and on
the one apple-tree, the pride of the place.

But she had never with her own hands plucked the yellow pussies from the
saughs (low willows) by the burn, nor found the wee violets, blue and
white, hiding themselves under last year's leaves.  She had never
watched the slow coming of, first the buds, and then the leaves on the
trees along the lanes, nor seen the hawthorn hedges all in bloom, nor
the low hills growing greener every day, nor the wandering clouds making
wandering shadows where the gowans--the countless "crimson-tipped
flowers"--were gleaming among the grass.  All this and more she saw this
year, as she lay in the strong, kind arms of Allison.  And as the days
went on it would not have been easy to say whether it was the little
child, or the sad and silent woman, who got the greater good from it
all.

For Allison could no longer move along the lanes and over the fields in
a dream, her inward eyes seeing other faraway fields and hills and a
lost home, and faces hidden for evermore, when a small hand was now and
then laid upon her cheek to call her back to the present.  The little
silvery voice was ever breaking in upon these dreary memories, and
drearier forebodings, with cooing murmurs of utter content, or with
shrill outbursts of eager delight, in the enjoyment of pleasures that
were all of Allie's giving.  And so what could Allie do but come out of
her own sorrowful musings and smile and rejoice in the child's joy, and
find a new happiness in the child's love.

There was much to be done in the house, but there was no day so busy or
so full of care but that Allison could manage to give the child a blink
of sunshine if the day were fair.  There was much to do out of the house
also, what with the cows and the garden and the glebe.  Cripple Sandy,
who was the minister's man-of-all-work, had all that he could do, and
more, in the narrow fields.  So Allison rose early and milked her cows,
and led them out herself, to no wide pasture, but to one of those fields
where she tethered them first and flitted them later in the morning when
they had cropped their little circle bare.  And both at the tethering
and the flitting Marjorie assisted when the day was fine, and it was a
possible thing.  She woke when Allison rose, and being first
strengthened by a cup of warm milk and a bit of bread, and then wrapped
warmly up in a plaid to keep her safe from the chill air of the morning,
she was ready for a half-hour of perfect enjoyment.  When that was over,
she was eager for another cup of milk and another sleep, which lasted
till breakfast was over and her brothers had all gone to school.

And when the time for the afternoon flitting of the cows came, Marjorie
was in the field once more, sitting on a plaid while the placid
creatures were moved on, and she and Allie went home again as they came,
through the lanes in which there were so many beautiful things.

Sometimes a neighbour met them, who had something to say to the child,
and sometimes they met the bairns coming from the school.  When they
came home by the longest way, as Marjorie liked best to do, they would
have a word with the schoolmistress, as she was taking the air at her
door when the labours of the day were over, and sometimes a smile and a
flower from Mrs Beaton in her garden over the way.  This was the very
best summer in all her life, Marjorie told her father one day, as Allie
laid her down on her couch in the parlour again.

All this was beginning to do the child good.  Even the neighbours
noticed the change after a little, and were glad also.  Some of them
meant that the coming and going passed the time and contented her.
Others said that it was well that her mother's heart was set at rest
about her, and that she got more time for all else that she had to do;
and all thought well of the new lass for her care of little Marjorie.

The mother, who had consented to these new doings with misgiving, began,
after a little, to see the change for the better that was being wrought
in the child.  Long before midsummer there was dawning a soft little
gleam of colour on Marjorie's cheek, not at all like the feverish tints
that used to come with weariness or fretfulness or excitement of any
kind.  The movements of the limbs and of the slender little body were
freer and stronger, and quite unconsciously, it seemed, she helped
herself in ways on which she had never ventured before.

Her father saw the change too, though not so soon as her mother; but
having seen it, he was the more hopeful of the two.  And by and by they
spoke to one another, saying if this thing could be done, or that, their
Marjorie might be helped and healed, and grow strong and tall like the
other bairns, and have a hopeful and happy life before her.  But they
paused when they had got thus far, knowing that the child was in God's
hands, and that if it were His will to bring about the fulfilment of
their desire, He would also show a way in which it was to be done.
Whether this might be or not, their little gentle darling would ay be,
as she had ay been, the dearest blessing in their happy home.

"And may God bless Allison Bain, however it is to be."

"Yes," said the mother.  "I think a blessing is already coming to her
through the child."