Amelia E. Barr There is a tear for all who die, A mourner o’er the humblest grave; But nations swell the funeral cry, And triumph weeps above the brave. For them is Sorrow’s purest sigh, O’er Ocean’s heaving bosom sent In vain their bones unburied lie, All earth becomes their monument. Born to the War of 1854 on October 21, 1854, a Daughter, called Red Cross.

The next night Vedder went away. His purposes were necessarily rather vague, but it was certain he would go to the front if he thought he could do any good there. He talked earnestly and long with Ragnor but when it came to parting, both men were strangely silent. They clasped hands and looked long and steadily into each other’s eyes. No words could interpret that look. It was a conversation for eternity.

In the meantime, the whole town was eager to 194 do something but what could they do that would give the immediate relief that was needed? There were no sewing machines then, women’s fingers and needles could not cope with the difficulty, even regarding the Orkney men who were suffering. To gather from every one the very necessary old linen seemed to be the very extent of their usefulness.

In these first days of the trouble, Rahal and Thora were serious and quiet. A dull, inexplicable melancholy shrouded the girl like a garment. The pretty home preparing for Ian and herself lost its interest. She refused to look forward and lived only in the unhappy present. The few words Ian has said about some wrong or trouble in the past years of his life overshadowed her. She was naturally very prescient and her higher self dwelt much in

However, if trouble lasts through the night, joy, or at least hope and expectation, comes in the morning; and certainly the first shock of grief settled 195 down into patient hoping and waiting. Vedder and Ian were both good correspondents and the silence and loneliness were constantly broken by their interesting letters. And joyful or sorrowful, Time goes by.

Sunna wrote occasionally but she said she found Edinburgh dull, and that she would gladly return to Kirkwall if it was not for the Pentland Firth and its winter tempers and tantrums.

The war [she added] has stopped all balls and even house parties. There is no dancing and no sports of any kind, and I believe skating and golf have been forbidden. Love-making is the only recreation allowed and I am not tempted to sin in this direction. The churches are always open and their bells clatter all day long. I have no lovers. Every man will talk of the war, and then they get offended if you ask them why they are not gone. I have had the pleasure of saying a few painful truths to these feather-bed patriots, and they tell each other, no doubt, that I am impossible and impertinent. One of them said to me, myself: “Wait a wee, Miss Vedder, I wouldna wonder but some crippled war lad will fa’ to your lot, when the puir fellows come marching home again.” The Edinburgh men are just city flunkeys, they would do fine to wait on our Norse men. I would like well to see a little dandy advocate I know here, trotting after Boris.

So days came and went, and the passion of 196 shame and sorrow died down and people did not talk of the war. But the doors of St. Magnus stood open all day long and there were always women praying there. They had begun to carry their anxieties and griefs to God; and that was well for God did not weary of their complaining. Women have the very heart of sympathy for a man’s griefs. God is the only refuge for a sorrowful woman.

Steadily the preparations for Thora’s marriage went on, but the spirit that animated their first beginnings had cooled down into that calm necessity, which always has to attend to all “finishings off.” Early in December, Thora’s future home was quite finished, and this last word expresses its beauty and completeness. Then Ragnor kissed his daughter, and put into her hand the key of the house and the deed of gift which made it her own forever. And in this same hour they decided that the first day of the New Year should be the wedding day; for Bishop Hedley would then be in Kirkwall and who else could marry the little Thora whom he had baptised and confirmed and welcomed into the fold of the church.

Nothing is more remarkable than the variety of moods in which women take the solemn initiatory 197 rite ushering them into their real life and their great and honourable duties. Thora was joyful as a bird in spring and never weary of examining the lovely home, the perfect wardrobe, and the great variety of beautiful presents that had been given her.

Very soon it was the twentieth of December, and Ian was expected on the twenty-third. Christmas preparations had now taken the place of marriage preparations for every item was ready for the latter event. There had been a little anxiety about the dress and veil, but they arrived on the morning of the twentieth and were beautiful and fitting in every respect. The dress was of the orthodox white satin and the veil fell from a wreath of orange flowers and myrtle leaves. And oh, how proud and happy Thora was in their possession. Several times that wonderful day she had run secretly to her room to examine and admire them.

On the morning of the twenty-first she reminded herself that in two days Ian would be with her and that in nine days she would be his wife. She was genuine and happy about the event. She made no pretences or reluctances. She loved Ian with all her heart, she was glad she was going 198 to be always with him. Life would then be full and she would be the happiest woman in the world. She asked her father at the breakfast table to send her, at once, any letters that might come for her in his mail. “I am sure there will be one from Ian,” she said, “and, dear Father, it hurts me to keep it waiting.”

About ten o’clock, Mrs. Beaton called and brought Thora a very handsome ring from Maximus Grant and a bracelet from herself. She stayed to lunch with the Ragnors and after the meal was over, they went upstairs to look at the wedding dress. “I want to see it on you, Thora,” said Mrs. Beaton, “I shall have a wedding dress to buy for my niece soon and I would like to know what kind of a fit Mrs. Scott achieves.” So Thora put on the dress, and Mrs. Beaton admitted that it “fit like a glove” and that she should insist on her niece Helen going to Mrs. Scott.

With many scattering, delaying remarks and good wishes, the lady finally bid Thora good-bye and Mrs. Ragnor went downstairs with her. Then Thora eagerly lifted two letters that had come in her father’s mail and been sent home to her. One was from Ian. “The last he will write to Thora Ragnor,” she said with a smile. “I will put it with 199 his first letter and keep them all my life long. So loving is he, so good, so handsome! There is no one like my Ian.” Twice over she read his loving letter and then laid it down and lifted the one which had come with it.

“Jean Hay,” she repeated, “who is Jean Hay?” Then she remembered the writer––an orphan girl living with a married brother who did not always treat her as kindly as he should have done. Hearing and believing this story, Rahal Ragnor hired the girl, taught her how to sew, how to mend and darn and in many ways use her needle. Then discovering that she had a genius for dressmaking, she placed her with a first-class modiste in Edinburgh to be properly instructed and liberally attended to all financial requisites; for Rahal Ragnor could not do anything unless it was wholly and perfectly done. Then Thora had dressed Jean from her own wardrobe and asked her father to send their protegÉe to Edinburgh on one of the vessels he controlled. And Jean had been heartily grateful, had done well, and risen to a place of trust in her employer’s business; and a few times every year she wrote to Mrs. Ragnor or Thora. All these circumstances were remembered by Thora in a moment. “Jean Hay!” she exclaimed. 200 “Well, Jean, you must wait a few minutes, until I have taken off my wedding dress. I am sorry I had to put it on––it was not very kind or thoughtful of Mrs. Beaton to ask me––I don’t believe mother liked her doing so––mother has a superstition or fret about everything. Well, then, it is no way spoiled–––” and she lifted it and the white silk petticoat belonging to the dress and carefully put them in the place Rahal had selected as the safest for their keeping. It was a large closet in the spare room and she went there with them. As she returned to her own room she heard her mother welcoming a favourite visitor and it pleased her. “Now I need not hurry,” she thought. “Mistress Vorn will stay an hour at least, and I can take my own time.”

“Taking her own time” evidently meant to Thora the reading of Ian’s letter over again. And also a little musing on what Ian had said. There was, however, no hurry about Jean Hay’s letter and it was so pleasant to drift among the happy thoughts that crowded into her consideration. So for half an hour Jean’s letter lay at her side untouched––Jean was so far outside her dreams and hopes that afternoon––but at length she lifted it and these were the words she read:

Dear Miss Thora:

I was hearing since last spring that thou wert going to be married on the son of the Rev. Dr. Macrae––on the young man called John Calvin Macrae. Very often I was hearing this, and always I was answering, “There will be no word of truth in that story. Miss Ragnor will not be noticing such a young man as that. No, indeed!”

Here Thora threw down the letter and sat looking at it upon the floor as if she would any moment tear it to pieces. But she did not, she finally lifted it and forced herself to continue reading:

I was hating to tell thee some things I knew, and I was often writing and then tearing up my letter, for it made me sick to be thy true friend in such a cruel way. But often I have heard the wise tell “when the knife is needed, the salve pot will be of no use.” Now then, this day, I tell myself with a sad heart, “Jean, thou must take the knife. The full time has come.”

“Why won’t the woman tell what she has got to tell,” said Thora in a voice of impatient anguish, and in a few minutes she whispered, “I am cold.” Then she threw a knitted cape over her shoulders and lifted the letter again, oh, so reluctantly, and read:

The young man will have told your father, that he is McLeod’s agent and a sort of steward of his large 202 properties. This does not sound like anything wrong, but often I have been told different. Old McLeod left to his son many houses. Three of them are not good houses, they are really fashionable gambling houses. Macrae has the management of them as well as of many others in various parts of the city. Of these others I have heard no wrong. I suppose they may be quite respectable.

This story has more to it. Whenever there is a great horse race there Macrae will be, and I saw myself in the daily newspapers that his name was among the winners on the horse Sergius. It was only a small sum he won, but sin is not counted in pounds and shillings. No, indeed! So there is no wonder his good father is feeling the shame of it.

Moreover, though he calls himself Ian, that is not his name. His name is John Calvin and his denial of his baptismal name, given to him at the Sabbath service, in the house of God, at the very altar of the same, is thought by some to be a denial of God’s grace and mercy. And he has been reasoned with on this matter by the ruling elder in his father’s kirk, but no reason would he listen to, and saying many things about Calvin I do not care to write.

Many stories go about young men and young women, and there is this and that said about Macrae. I have myself met him on Prince’s Street in the afternoon very often, parading there with various gayly dressed women. I do not blame him much for that. The Edinburgh girls are very forward, not like the Norse girls, who are modest and retiring in their ways. I am forced to say that Macrae is a very gay young 203 man, and of course you know all that means without more words about it. He dresses in the highest fashion, goes constantly to theatres with some lady or other, and I do not wonder that people ask, “Where does he get the money? Does he gamble for it?” For he does not go to any kirk on the Sabbath unless he is paid to go there and sing, which he does very well, people say. In his own rooms he is often heard playing the piano and singing music that is not sacred or fit for the holy day. And his father is the most religious man in Edinburgh. It is just awful! I fear you will never forgive me, Miss Thora, but I have still more and worse to tell you, because it is, as I may say, personally heard and not this or that body’s clash-ma-claver. Nor did I seek the same, it came to me through my daily work and in a way special and unlooked-for, so that after hearing it, my conscience would no longer be satisfied and I was forced, as it were, to the writing of this letter to you.

I dare say Macrae may have spoken to you anent his friendship with Agnes and Willie Henderson, indeed Willie Henderson and John Macrae have been finger and thumb ever since they played together. Now Willie’s father is an elder in Dr. Macrae’s kirk and if all you hear anent him be true––which I cannot vouch for––he is a man well regarded both in kirk and market place––that is, he was so regarded until he married again about two years ago. For who, think you, should he marry but a proud upsetting Englishwoman, who was bound to be master and mistress both o’er the hale household?

Then Miss Henderson showed fight and her brother 204 Willie stood by her. And Miss Henderson is a spunky girl and thought bonnie by some people, and has a tongue so well furnished with words to defend what she thinks her rights, that it leaves nobody uncertain as to what thae rights may be. Weel, there has been nothing but quarreling in the elder’s house ever since the unlucky wedding; and in the first year of the trial Willie Henderson borrowed money––I suppose of John Macrae––and took himself off to America, and some said the elder was glad of it and others said he was sair down-hearted and disappointed.

After that, Miss Agnes was never friends with her stepmother. It seems the woman wanted her to marry a nephew of her ain kith and kin, and in this matter her father was of the same mind. The old man doubtless wanted a sough of peace in his own home. That was how things stood a couple of weeks syne, but yestreen I heard what may make the change wanted. This is how it happened.

Yesterday afternoon Mrs. Baird came to Madame David’s to have a black velvet gown fitted. Madame called on Jean Hay to attend her in the fitting and to hang the long skirt properly––for it is a difficult job to hang a velvet skirt, and Jean Hay is thought to be very expert anent the set and swing of silk velvet, which has a certain contrariness of its own. Let that pass. I was kneeling on the floor, setting the train, when Mrs. Baird said: “I suppose you have heard, Madame, the last escapade of that wild son of the great Dr. Macrae?” Then I was all ears, the more so when I heard Madam say: “I heard a whisper of something, but I was not heeding it. Folks never seem 205 to weary of finding fault with the handsome lad.”

“Well, Madame,” said Mrs. Baird, “I happen to know about this story. Seeing with your own eyes is believing, surely!”

“What did you see?” Madame asked.

“I saw enough to satisfy me. You know my house is opposite to the West End Hotel, and last Friday I saw Macrae go there and he was dressed up to the nines. He went in and I felt sure he had gone to call on some lady staying there. So I watched, and better watched, for he did not come out for two hours, and I concluded they had lunched together! For when Macrae came out of the hotel, he spoke to a cabman, and then waited until a young lady and her maid appeared. He put the young lady into the cab, had a few minutes’ earnest conversation with her, then the maid joined her mistress and they two drove away.”

“Well, now, Mrs. Baird,” said Madame, “there was nothing in that but just a courteous luncheon together.”

“Wait, Madame! I felt there was more, so I took a book and sat down by my window. And just on the edge of the dark I saw the two women return, and a little later a waiter put lights in an upper parlour and he spread a table for dinner there and Macrae and the young lady ate it together. Afterwards they went away in a cab together.” Then Madame asked if the maid was with them, and Mrs. Baird said she thought she was but had not paid particular attention.

Madame said something to me about the length of the train and then Mrs. Baird seemed annoyed at her inattention, and she added: “Macrae was advertised to sing in the City Hall the next night at a mass meeting 206 of citizens about abrogating slavery in the United States, and he was not there––broke his engagement! What do you think of that? The next night, Sabbath, he did the same to Dr. Fraser’s kirk, where he had promised to sing a pro-Christmas canticle. And this morning I heard that he is going to the Orkneys to marry a rich and beautiful girl who lives there. Now what do you think of your handsome Macrae? I can tell you he is on every one’s tongue.” And Madame said, “I have no doubt of it and I’ll warrant nobody knows what they are talking about.”

After this the fitting on was not pleasant and I finished my part of it as quickly as possible. Indeed, Miss Thora, I was miserable about you and so pressed in spirit to tell you these things that I could hardly finish my day’s work. For my conscience kept urging me to do my duty to you, for it is many favours you have done me in the past. Kindly pardon me now, and believe me,

Your humble but sincere friend, Jean Hay.

This letter Thora read to the last word but she was nearly blind when she reached it. All her senses rang inward. “I am dying!” she thought, and she tried to reach the bed but only succeeded in stumbling against a small table full of books, knocking it down and falling with it.

Mistress Ragnor and her visitor heard the fall and they were suddenly silent. Immediately, however, 207 they went to the foot of the stairway and called, “Thora.” There was no answer, and the mother’s heart sank like lead, as she hastened to her daughter’s room and threw open the door. Then she saw her stricken child, lying as if dead upon the floor. Cries and calls and hurrying feet followed, and the unconscious girl was quickly freed from all physical restraints and laid at the open window. But all the ordinary household methods of restoring consciousness were tried without avail and the case began to assume a dangerous aspect.

At this moment Ragnor arrived. He knelt at his child’s side and drew her closer and closer, whispering her name with the name of the Divine One; and surely it was in response to his heart-breaking entreaties the passing soul listened and returned. “Father,” was the first whisper she uttered; and with a glowing, grateful heart, the father lifted her in his arms and laid her on her bed.

Then Rahal gave him the two letters and sent him away. Thora was still “far off,” or she would have remembered her letters but it was near the noon of the next day when she asked her mother where they were.

“Thy father has them.”

“I am sorry, so sorry!”

That was all she said but the subject appeared to distress her for she closed her eyes, and Rahal kissed away the tears that slowly found their way down the white, stricken face. However, from this hour she rallied and towards night fell into a deep sleep which lasted for fourteen hours; and it was during this anxious period of waiting that Ragnor talked to his wife about the letters which were, presumably, the cause of the trouble.

“Those letters I gave thee, Coll, did thou read both of them?”

“Both of them I read. Ian’s was the happy letter of an expectant bridegroom. Only joy and hope was in it. It was the other one that was a death blow. Yes, indeed, it was a bad, cruel letter!”

“And the name? Who wrote it?”

“Jean Hay.”

“Jean Hay! What could Jean have to do with Thora’s affairs?”

“Well, then, her conscience made her interfere. She had heard some evil reports about Ian’s life and she thought it her duty, after yours and Thora’s kindness to her, to report these stories.”

“A miserable return for our kindness! This is what I notice––when people want to say cruel things, they always blame their conscience or their duty for making them do it.”

“Here is Jean’s letter. Thou, thyself, must read it.”

Rahal read it with constantly increasing anger and finally threw it on the table with passionate scorn. “Not one word of this stuff do I believe, Coll! Envy and jealousy sent that news, not gratitude and good will! No, indeed! But I will tell thee, Coll, one thing I have always found sure, it is this; that often, much evil comes to the good from taking people out of their poverty and misfortunes. They are paying a debt they owe from the past and if we assume that debt we have it to pay in some wise. That is the wisdom of the old, the wisdom learned by sad experience. I wish, then, that I had let the girl pay her own debt and carry her own burden. She is envious of Thora. Yet was Thora very good to her. Do I believe in her gratitude? Not I! Had she done this cruel thing out of a kind heart, she would have sent this letter to me and left the telling or the not telling to my love and best judgment. I will not believe anything against Ian Macrae! Nothing at all!”

“Much truth is in thy words, Rahal, and it is not on Jean Hay’s letter I will do anything. I will take only Ian’s ‘yes,’ or ‘no’ on any accusation.”

“You may do that safely, Coll, I know it.”

“And I will go back to Edinburgh with him and see his father. Perhaps we have all taken the youth too far on his handsome person and his sweet amiability.”

“Thou wrote to his father when Thora was engaged to him, with thy permission.”

“Well, then, I did.”

“What said his father?”

“Too little! He was cursed short about all I named. I told him Thora was good and fair and well educated; and that she would have her full share in my estate. I told him all that I intended to do for them about their home and the place which I intended for Ian in my business, and referred him to Bishop Hedley as to my religious, financial, social and domestic standing.”

“Why did thou name Bishop Hedley to him? They are as far apart as Leviticus and St. John. And what did he say to thee in reply?”

“That my kindness was more than his son deserved, etc. In response to our invitation to be 211 present at the marriage ceremony, he said it was quite impossible, the journey was too long and doubtful, especially in the winter; that he was subject to sea-sickness and did not like to leave his congregation over Sunday. Rahal, I felt the paper on which his letter was written crinkling and crackling in my hand, it was that stiff with ecclesiastic pomp and spiritual pride. I would not show thee the letter, I put it in the fire.”

“Poor Ian! I think then, that he has had many things to suffer.”

“Rahal, this is what I will do. I will meet the packet on Saturday and we will go first to my office and talk the Hay letter over together. If I bring Ian home with me, then something is possible, but if I come home alone, then Thora must understand that all is over––that the young man is not to be thought of.”

“That would kill her.”

“So it might be. But better is death than a living misery. If Ian is what Jean Hay says he is, could we think of our child living with him? Impossible! Rahal, dear wife, whatever can be done I will do, and that with wisdom and loving kindness. Thy part is harder, it must be with our dear Thora.”

“That is so. And if there has to be parting, it will be almost impossible to spread the plaster as far as the sore.”

“There is the Great Physician–––”

“I know.”

“Tell her what I have said.”

“I will do that; but just yet, she is not minding much what any one says.”

However, on Saturday afternoon Thora left her bed and dressed herself in the gown she had prepared for her bridegroom’s arrival. The nervous shock had been severe and she looked woefully like, and yet unlike, herself. Her eyes were full of tears, she trembled, she could hardly support herself. If one should take a fresh green leaf and pass over it a hot iron, the change it made might represent the change in Thora. Jean Hay’s letter had been the hot iron passed over her. She had been told of her father’s decision, but she clung passionately to her faith in Ian and her claim on her father’s love and mercy.

“Father will do right,” she said, “and if he does, Ian will come home with him.”

The position was a cruel one to Conall Ragnor and he went to meet the packet with a heavy heart. Then Ian’s joyful face and his impatience 213 to land made it more so, and Ragnor found it impossible to connect wrong-doing with the open, handsome countenance of the youth. On the contrary, he found himself without intention declaring:

“Well, then, I never found anything the least zig-zaggery about what he said or did. His words and ways were all straight. That is the truth.”

Yet Ian’s happy mood was instantly dashed by Ragnor’s manner. He did not take his offered hand and he said in a formal tone: “Ian, we will go to my office before we go to the house. I must ask thee some questions.”

“Very well, sir. Thora, I hope, is all right?”

“No. She has been very ill.”

“Then let me go to her, sir, at once.”

“Later, I will see about that.”

“Later is too late, let us go at once. If Thora is sick–––”

“Be patient. It is not well to talk of women on the street. No wise man, who loves his womenkin, does that.”

Then Ian was silent; and the walk through the busy streets was like a walk in a bad dream. The place and circumstances felt unreal and he was conscious of the sure presence of a force closing 214 about him, even to his finger tips. Vainly he tried to think. He felt the trouble coming nearer and nearer, but what was it? What had he done? What had he failed to do? What was he to be questioned about?

Young as he was his experiences had taught him to expect only injury and wrong. The Ragnor home and its love and truth had been the miracle that had for nine months turned his brackish water of life into wine. Was it going to fail him, as everything else had done? He laughed inwardly at the cruel thought and whispered to himself: “This, too, can be borne, but oh, Thora, Thora!” and the two words shattered his pride and made him ready to weep when he sat down in Ragnor’s office and saw the kind, pitiful face of the elder man looking at him. It gave him the power he needed and he asked bluntly what questions he was required to answer.

Ragnor gave him the unhappy letter and he read it with a look of anger and astonishment. “Father,” he said, “all this woman writes is true and not true; and of all accusations, these are the worst to defend. I must go back to my very earliest remembrances in order to fairly state my case, and if you will permit me to do this, in the 215 presence of your wife and Thora, I will then accept whatever decision you make.”

For at least three minutes Ragnor made no answer. He sat with closed eyes and his face held in the clasp of his left hand. Ian was bending forward, eagerly watching him. There was not a movement, not a sound; it seemed as if both men hardly breathed. But when Ragnor moved, he stood up. “Let us be going,” he said, “they are anxious. They are watching. You shall do as you say, Ian.”

Rahal saw them first. Thora was lying back in her mother’s chair with closed eyes. She could not bear to look into the empty road watching for one who might be gone forever. Then in a blessed moment, Rahal whispered, “They are coming!”

“Both? Both, Mother?”

“Both!”

“Thank God!” And she would have cried out her thanks and bathed them in joyful tears if she had been alone. But Ian must not see her weeping. Now, especially, he must be met with smiles. And then, when she felt herself in Ian’s embrace, they were both weeping. But oh, how great, how blessed, how sacramental are those joys that we baptise with tears!

During the serving of dinner there was no conversation but such as referred to the war and other public events. Many great ones had transpired since they parted, and there was plenty to talk about: the battles of Balaklava and Inkerman had been fought; the never-to-be-forgotten splendour of Scarlett’s Charge with the Heavy Brigade, and the still more tragically splendid one of the Light Brigade, had both passed into history.

More splendid and permanent than these had been the trumpet “call” of Russell in the Times, asking the women of England who among them were ready to go to Scutari Hospital and comfort and help the men dying for England? “Now,” he cried,

Florence Nightingale and her band of trained nurses, mainly from the Roman Catholic Sisters of Mercy, and St. John’s Protestant House, was the instant answer. In six days they were ready and without any flourish of trumpets, at the dark, quiet midnight, they left England for Scutari and in that hour the Red Cross Society was born.

“How long is it since they sailed?” asked Rahal.

“A month,” answered Ian, “but the controversy about it is still raging in the English papers.”

“What has anyone to say against it?” asked Rahal. “The need was desperate, the answer quick. What, then, do they say?”

“The prudery of the English middle class was shocked at the idea of young women nursing in military hospitals. They considered it ‘highly improper.’ Others were sure women would be more trouble than help. Many expect their health to fail, and think they will be sent back to English hospitals in a month.”

“I thought,” said Ragnor, “that the objections were chiefly religious.”

“You are right,” replied Ian. “The Calvinists are afraid Miss Nightingale’s intention is to make the men Catholics in their dying hour. Others feel sure Miss Nightingale is an Universalist, or an Unitarian, or a Wesleyan Methodist. The fact is, Florence Nightingale is a devout Episcopalian.”

A pleasant little smile parted Ragnor’s lips, and he said with an Episcopalian suavity: “The Wesleyans and the Episcopalians, in doctrine, are much 218 alike. We regard them as brethren;” and just while he spoke, Ragnor looked like some ecclesiastical prelate.

“There is little to wonder at in the churches disagreeing about Miss Nightingale,” said Rahal, “it is not to be expected that they would believe in her, when they do not believe in each other.” As she spoke she stepped to the fireside and touched the bell rope, and a servant entered and began to clear the table and put more wood on the fire, and to turn out one of the lamps at Rahal’s order. Ragnor had gone out to have a quiet smoke in the fresh air while Rahal was sending off all the servants to a dance at the Fisherman’s Hall. Ian and Thora were not interested in these things; they sat close together, talking softly of their own affairs.

Without special request, they drew closer to the hearth and to each other. Then Ragnor took out a letter and handed it to Ian. He was sitting at Thora’s side and her hand was in his hand. He let it fall and took the letter offered him.

“I cannot explain this letter,” he said, “unless I preface it with some facts regarding my unhappy childhood and youth. I am, as you know, the son of Dr. Macrae, but I have been a disinherited 219 son ever since I can remember. I suppose that in my earliest years I was loved and kindly treated, but I have no remembrance of that time. I know only that before I was five years old, my father had accepted the solemn conviction that I was without election to God’s grace. Personally I was a beautiful child, but I was received and considered, body and soul, as unredeemable. Father then regarded me as a Divine decree which it was his duty to receive with a pious acquiescence. My mother pitied and, in her way, loved me, and suffered much with me. I have a little sister also, who would like to love me, but there is in all her efforts just that touch of Phariseeism which destroys love.”

“But, Ian, there must have been some reason for your father’s remarkable conviction?”

“That is most likely. If so, he never explained the fact to me or even to my mother. She told me once that he did not suspect that I had missed God’s election until I was between five and six years old. I suppose that about that age I began to strengthen his cruel fear by my antipathy to the kirk services and my real and unfortunate inability to learn the Shorter Catechism. This was a natural short-coming. I could neither spell or pronounce 220 the words I was told to learn and to memorise them was an impossible thing.”

“Could not your mother help you?”

“She tried. She wept over me as she tried, and I made an almost superhuman effort to comprehend and remember. I could not. I was flogged, I was denied food and even water. I was put in dark rooms. I was forbid all play and recreation. I went through this martyrdom year after year and I finally became stubborn and would try no longer. In the years that followed, until I was sixteen, my daily sufferings were great, but I remember them mainly for my mother’s sake, who suffered with me in all I suffered. Nor am I without pity for my father. He honestly believed that in punishing me he was doing all he could to save me from everlasting punishment. Yes, sir! Do not shake your head! I have heard him praying, pleading with God, for some token of my election to His mercy. You see it was John Calvin.”

“John Calvin!” ejaculated Ragnor, “how is that?”

“It was his awful tenets I had to learn; and when I was young I could not learn them, and when I grew older I would not learn them. My father had called me John Calvin and I detested 221 the name. On my eighteenth birthday I asked him to have it changed. He was very angry at my request. I begged him passionately to do so. I said it ruined my life, that I could do nothing under that name. ‘Give me your own name, Father,’ I entreated, ‘and I will try and be a good man!’

“He said something to me, I never knew exactly what, but the last word was more than I could bear and my reply was an oath. Then he lifted the whip at his side and struck me.”

Rahal and Thora were sobbing. Ragnor looked in the youth’s face with shining eyes and asked, almost in a whisper, “What did thou do?”

“I had been struck often enough before to have made me indifferent, but at this moment some new strength and feeling sprang up in my heart. I seized his arms and the whip fell to the floor. I lifted it and said, ‘Sir, if you ever again use a whip in place of decent words to me, I will see you no more until we meet for the judgment of God. Then I will pity you for the life-long mistake you have made.’ My father looked at me with eyes I shall never forget, no, not in all eternity! He burst into agonizing prayer and weeping and I went and told mother to go to him. I left the 222 house there and then. I had not a halfpenny, and I was hungry and cold and sick with an intolerable sense of wrong.”

“Father!” said Thora, in a voice broken with weeping. “Is not this enough?” And Ragnor leaned forward and took Thora’s hand but he did not speak. Neither did he answer Rahal’s look of entreaty. On the contrary he asked:

“Then, Ian? Then, what did thou do?”

“I felt so ill I went to see Dr. Finlay, our family physician. He knew the family trouble, because he had often attended mother when she was ill in consequence of it. I did not need to make a complaint. He saw my condition and took me to his wife and told her to feed and comfort me. I remained in her care four days, and then he offered to take me into his office and set me to reading medical text books, while I did the office work.”

“What was this work?”

“I was taught how to prepare ordinary medicines, to see callers when the doctor was out, and make notes of, and on, their cases. I helped the doctor in operations, I took the prescriptions to patients and explained their use, etc. In three years I became very useful and helpful and I was 223 quite happy. Then Dr. Finlay was appointed to some exceptionally fine post in India, private physician to some great Rajah, and the Finlay family hastily prepared for their journey to Delhi. I longed to go with them but I had not the money requisite. With Dr. Finlay I had had a home but only money enough to clothe me decently. I had not a pound left and mother could not help me, and Uncle Ian was in the Madeira Isles with his sick wife. So the Finlays went without me; and I can feel yet the sense of loneliness and poverty that assailed me, when I shut their door behind me and walked into the cold street and knew not what to do or where to go.”

“How old were you then, Ian?” asked Ragnor.

“I was twenty years old within a few days, and I had one pound, sixteen shillings in my pocket. Five pounds from an Episcopal church would be due in two weeks for my solo and part singing in their services; but they were never very prompt in their payment and that was nothing to rely on in my present need. I took to answering advertisements, and did some of the weariest tramping looking for work that poor humanity can do. When I met Kenneth McLeod, I had broken my 224 last shilling. I was like a hungry, lost child, and the thought of my mother came to me and I felt as if my heart would break.

“The next moment I saw Kenneth McLeod coming up Prince’s Street. It was nearly four years since we had seen each other, but he knew me at once and called me in his old kind way. Then he looked keenly at me, and asked: ‘What is the matter, Ian? The old trouble?’

“I was so heartless and hungry I could hardly keep back tears as I answered: ‘It is that and everything else! Ken, help me, if you can.’ ‘Come with me!’ he answered, and I went with him into the Queen’s Hotel and he ordered dinner, and while we were eating I told him my situation. Then he said, ‘I can help you, Ian, if you will help me. You know that all my happiness is on the sea and father kept me on one or another of his trading boats as much as possible from my boyhood, so that I am now a clever enough navigator. Two years ago my father died and I am in a lot of trouble about managing the property he left me. Now, if you will take the oversight of my Edinburgh property, I can take my favourite boat and look after the coast trade of the Northern Islands.’

“What could I say? I was dumb with surprise and gratitude. I never thought there was anything wrong in our contract. I believed the work had come in answer to my prayer for help and I thanked God and Kenneth McLeod for it.”

Here Mrs. Ragnor rose, saying, “Coll, my dear one, Thora and I will now leave thee. I am sure Ian has done as well as he could do and we hope thou wilt judge him kindly.” Then the women went upstairs and Ragnor remained silent until Ian said:

“I am very anxious, sir.”

Then Ragnor stood up and slowly answered, “Ian, now is the time to take council of my pillow. What I have to say I will say later. This is not a thing to be settled by a yes or no. I must think over what thou hast told me. I must have some words with my wife and daughter. Sleep one night at least over thy trouble, there are many things to consider; especially this question of the young lady who is made the last count of Jean Hay’s letter. What hast thou to say about her? She seems to have had some strong claim upon thy––shall we say friendship?”

“You might say much more than friendship, sir, and yet wrong neither man nor woman by it. 226 Why, the young lady was Agnes Henderson, the sister of Willie Henderson, who is my soul’s brother and my second self. Thora must have heard all about Agnes!”

“Is she Deacon Scot Henderson’s daughter?”

“Of course she is! Who else would I have left two engagements to serve? But Agnes is dear to me, perhaps dearer than my own sister. Since she was nine years old, we have studied and played together. Willie and Agnes were the only loves and only friends of my desolate boyhood. You have doubtless heard how unhappy the deacon’s second marriage has been. Both Willie and Agnes refused the stepmother he gave them, and last year Willie went to New York, where he is doing very well. But Agnes has been more and more wretched, and a recent proposal of marriage between herself and the stepmother’s nephew has made her life intolerable. Two weeks ago I had a letter from Willie, telling me he had just written her, advising an immediate ‘give-up’ of the whole situation. He told her to take the first good steamer and come to him. He also urged her to send for me and take my help and advice about the voyage. Two weeks ago last Friday she did so and I went at once to the West End 227 Hotel to see her. She had disguised herself so cleverly that it was difficult to recognise her. I went with her to her sitting room and there I found the woman who had waited on her all her life long. I knew her well for she had often scolded me for leading Agnes into danger.

“I ate lunch with Agnes and during it I told her to transfer all her money not required for travelling expenses to the Bank of New York; and I promised to go at once and secure a passage for herself and maid––for seeing that the Atlantic would leave her dock for New York about the noon hour of the next day, haste was necessary. I did not wish to go to Liverpool because of my two engagements, but Agnes was so insistent on my presence I could not refuse her. Well, perhaps I was wrong to yield to her entreaties.”

“No, hardly,” said Ragnor. “Going on board a big steamer at Liverpool must be a muddling business––not fit for two simple women like Agnes Henderson and her maid.”

“I don’t remember thinking of that but I could hear my friend Willie telling me, ‘See her safe on board, Ian. Don’t leave her till she is in the captain’s care. Do this for me, Ian!’ And I did it for both Agnes’ and Willie’s sake but mainly for 228 Willie’s, for I love him. He is my right-hand friend, always. Perhaps I did wrong.”

“It is a pity there was any mystification about it. Was it necessary for Agnes Henderson to disguise herself?”

“Perhaps not, but it prevented trouble and disappointment. Her father supposed her to be at her uncle’s home. On Saturday afternoon he went to see her and found she had not been there at all. He returned to Edinburgh and could get no trace of her, nor was she located until I returned and informed him that she was on the Atlantic.”

There was a few moments of silence and then Ian said, “Have I done anything unpardonable? Surely you will not let that jealous, envious letter stand between Thora and myself?”

Then Ragnor answered, “Tonight I will say neither this nor that on the matter. I will sleep over the subject and take counsel of One wiser than myself. Thou had better do likewise. Many things are to consider.”

And Ian went away without a word. There was anger in his heart, and as he sat gloomily in his dimly lit room and felt the damp chill of the midnight, he told himself that he had been hardly judged. “I have done nothing wrong,” he whispered 229 passionately. “Old McLeod collected his own rents and looked after his own property and no one thought he did wrong. He was an elder in one of the largest Edinburgh kirks and the favourite chairman in missionary meetings, but because I did not go to kirk, what was business in him was sin in me.

“As to the gambling houses, I had nothing to do with them but to collect lawful money, due the McLeod estate; and as far as I can see, men who gamble for money are quite respectable if they get what they gamble for. There was that old reprobate Lord Sinclair. He redeemed the Sinclair estates by gambling and he married the beautiful daughter of the noble Seaforths. Nobody blamed him. Pshaw! It is all a matter of money––or it is my ill luck.” And to such irritating reflections he finally fell asleep.